Common Sense
by Stone Elbow
Summary: An 8-year-old Naruto sneaks into the library and finds a thin little book titled "How To Be a Ninja", authored by his hero, the Yondaime. Everything in the book is just common sense: a trait that no one in the Elemental Countries seems to have. Four years later, a Kage-level shinobi becomes a genin...
1. Chapter 1: Dear Descendant

Author's Note:

This fic is written in English, and I will assume most of you readers know English better than you know Japanese. Therefore, I will use English terms as much as possible, with the exception of proper nouns: jutsu (technique) names, village names, and Kage ordinal prefixes (Shodaime, Nodaime, Sandaime. Yondaime, etc.) English translations of most Japanese words will appear in parentheses after the first use of each word, e.g., Katon: Gokakyu no Jutsu (Fire Release: Great Fireball). And given names come before surnames: "Naruto Uzumaki", not "Uzumaki Naruto".

Warnings: Naruto is kind of OP for a twelve-year old. He IS a Kage-level ninja. Don't worry, there are plenty of other S-ranked ninja in the Narutoverse to give him a proper fight. I'll keep it PG-13, occasional swear words, violence, killing, but no descriptions of gore and no lemons.

Please review. If you don't like my story, write me a scathing flame of a review. If you can, make your insults witty and creative. If you can't, write some shit anyway. Anything to increase the number of reviews on my fic, and thus the number of people who will find it using "Sort by Reviews". On the other hand, positive feedback and constructive criticism is greatly appreciated, but you know that already.

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any of the characters in this story.

Chapter 1: Dear Descendant

It was Wednesday of the third week of Naruto's first year at Shinobi Academy. An 8-year-old Naruto Uzumaki peeked around the doorway of the Academy library, wondering if the nasty librarian would let him in today. He didn't actually _want_ to set foot in the library, but Iruka-sensei had assigned homework: use the library to look up the names of all the past Kages of the Five Great Hidden Villages. He was late in turning it in, but it wasn't his fault: the librarian had always kicked him out with a nasty sneer on his face, sometimes literally.

Looks like today was Naruto's lucky day.

Slowly peering through the crack between the door and its frame on the hinge side, Naruto found that the librarian was missing. Maybe he was out to lunch and forgot to lock the door? Naruto didn't eat lunch, so it was like a free period to him.

"Yes!" whispered Naruto. He tiptoed into the library.

Twenty minutes later, Naruto had enough notes to finish his homework. Putting the history book back into the shelf, he was about to leave when he noticed the author's name on a thin little paperback on the shelf below. It said:

How to be a Ninja  
 _by Minato Namikaze_

Huh. Wasn't that the name of his hero, the Yondaime (Fourth) Hokage? Naruto checked his homework notes again. Yup, Minato Namikaze, Fourth Hokage of the Hidden Leaf, with a 4-year tenure ending with his defeat of the Kyuubi and death at the age of 28.

Naruto did _not_ enjoy reading. But the Yondaime was his hero… he wavered before grabbing the book and stuffing it under his jacket. The librarian would be here in ten minutes. He could read it after school.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Late that night, Naruto pulled out the book and opened it to the first page. It said:

Chapter 1: Introduction.

Dear Descendant,

My name is Minato Namikaze, Yondaime Hokage of Konohagakure no Sato, the Village Hidden in the Leaves. If you're reading this, you must be a descendant of me and my lovely wife, Kushina Uzumaki, because I placed a seal inside the cover of this book preventing anyone who is not our descendant from reading this book. Anyone else will see a Genjutsu (Illusion) of a boring, outdated history textbook, and will feel a strong inclination to completely ignore the book, much less open it. If they manage to get past the Genjutsu and actually open the book, it will self-destruct in an awesome ball of fire. I have hidden copies of this book in various libraries around Konoha and some of the other villages in the hope that my descendants will be curious and intelligent enough to find them.

I've discovered that the vast majority of people in the Elemental Countries completely lack any kind of common sense when it comes to the fields of Ninjutsu (Ninja Techniques) and Fuinjutsu (Sealing Arts). They use ridiculously flashy, difficult, and expensive Ninjutsu to do simple things. They believe that certain things can only be done with clan bloodlines. They use powerful and dangerous Ninjutsu without knowing how they work or why. And many people completely ignore the field of Fuinjutsu, which is, in my opinion, the most powerful Ninja Art in existence. A large number of so-called ninja have never used any form of Fuinjutsu beyond exploding tags and storage scrolls.

This book will guide you on the path to becoming a _true_ Ninja, a warrior in the shadows, a hidden protector of the innocent. This book will give you basic information on Chakra, Ninjutsu, and Fuinjutsu, and tell you how to use that knowledge in simple and almost obvious ways that, strangely, no one else in the world seems to have figured out. You'll have to look elsewhere for Taijutsu (Unarmed Martial Arts) and other techniques, as I haven't found those fields to be underused or misunderstood like Ninjutsu and Fuinjutsu are.

I ask that when you're done reading this, you replace it in the library where you found it. This particular copy is placed in the Konoha Shinobi Academy Library, near the history textbooks needed for the traditional first homework assignment given to all students. I also ask that, if you find yourself in a village that Konoha was not allied with during my tenure as Hokage, you hide copies of this book in their library, secured with the seal you can find in the appendix (very last page).

This is your birthright. I hope you enjoy the read!

Minato Namikaze

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Huh. Naruto closed the book, looked at the title, and opened it again. Nope, definitely not a boring history textbook. Maybe he really was related to the Yondaime? That would explain the spiky yellow hair and bright blue eyes. It would also explain why he was an orphan, since Minato Namikaze was too young to be Naruto's grandfather.

Now who was this Kushina Uzumaki character? If he didn't grow up with her she was either dead or she had really abandoned him like the villagers said. Was it bad to hope that she was dead?

Well, maybe he could search for more information on her tomorrow. Worrying about it now wouldn't help, and the next chapter was beckoning.

"Chapter 2: Secrets and Lies: How to Hide Your Skills and Avoid Paperwork"

If paperwork was anything like homework, this could be the most important chapter in the book!


	2. Chapter 2: Secrets and Lies

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any of the characters in this story.

Chapter 2: Secrets and Lies: How to Hide Your Skills and Avoid Paperwork

It was Graduation Day at Shinobi Academy. Iruka Umino walked into a roomful of twelve-year-olds and chaos, and found Sakura Haruno and Ino Yamanaka sitting on each side of Sasuke Uchiha. Both of the girls were completely ignoring Sasuke and fighting with each other across his face… about who should be Sasuke's girlfriend… literally, they were shaking fists at each other in front of Sasuke's face.

Iruka hid his camera under a genjutsu and snapped a photo. For memories. Not for blackmail. Uh-huh.

Iruka looked around the rest of the room. Shikamaru Nara and Choji Akimichi, Ino's future teammates, the next generation of Ino-Shika-Cho. Kiba Inuzuka, with Akamaru on his head, if that boy wanted to be a tough-guy alpha male, the cute and affectionate little puppy wasn't helping. Shino Aburame, sunglasses, high collar, spiky hair. Hinata Hyuuga, if that girl had confidence she would have been the top kunoichi (female ninja) of the class. Speaking of Naruto… there he was, lounging in the back row beside Shikamaru. Iruka made a friendly smirk when Naruto gave him a finger wave.

And... there were a bunch of non-descript characters with generic faces who wouldn't make it past the second Genin Exam, whose names Iruka probably knew but couldn't bother to remark on because he didn't want readers to feel sorry for them when they failed.

"ALRIGHT LISTEN UP!" shouted Iruka, using his Big Head Jutsu.

Everyone jumped except Naruto and Shikamaru.

After giving his standard pep talk / graduation speech, Iruka announced the teams.

"Team 7: Sasuke Uchiha. Sakura Haruno. Naruto Uzumaki. Your Jōnin Sensei is Kakashi Hatake."

Sakura squealed. Ino growled. Sasuke said, "Hn."

Naruto just ignored them, smirking internally. _Yup, Dead Last and Rookie of the Year_ _with the Top Kunoichi_ _, just like the last three Team Seven's._ _Perfect, those two are so useless I won't have any hesitation in leaving them behind._

It was a good thing Naruto had improved his chakra control to the point where he could use low-level genjutsu like the standard Bunshin (clone). If he hadn't done that, he would have had to ace the written test in order to pass the Academy final, and that would have been _extremely_ suspicious.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"WHERE'S NARUTO?" screamed Sakura. It wasn't that she didn't appreciate the one-on-one time with Sasuke. The problem was, she'd been alone with Sasuke for three hours now and she hadn't been able to gripe or complain about ANYTHING. And Sasuke hadn't said anything further than, "Hn." And that was once, when Sakura greeted him "Hello" in a too-sweet voice. The dam had finally broken, and now Sakura was tearing loose. "I don't know what it is with him and our new sensei, but if they think it's okay to be late THREE HOURS, well, it's NOT!"

"Yo," said Naruto, appearing in the seat next to Sakura.

Sakura screamed. "DON'T SCARE ME LIKE THAT NARUTO YOU IDIOT!" She swung her fist at Naruto. He ducked. Kakashi cleared his throat from the doorway, stopping Sakura from trying again.

"My first impression of you… troublesome," said Kakashi, his voice bored. "Meet me on the roof in ten minutes."

"Welp, see ya there," said Naruto. He somersaulted back to the ceiling, where he'd been sticking upside down and meditating for the entire three hours, completely unnoticed until he sensed Kakashi arriving. Running over to window, Naruto slipped out and vanished.

"Stupid Naruto, trying to look cool. C'mon Sasuke, let's walk up to the roof _together_."

"Hn."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Introductions," said Kakashi.

When it came to his turn, Naruto said, "I have some likes. I have a few dislikes. My hobbies… I might tell you when I trust you. My dreams… well right now my dream is to pass the Genin test."

"Idiot, we already passed the Genin test." Apparently Sasuke could say something other than "Hn."

"Hmm, well done," said Kakashi, with an eye smile. He told them about the _real_ Genin test, and ordered them to meet him at Training Ground 7 at 5:00 AM.

"Oh, and I _suggest_ you skip breakfast. Don't want you throwing up on me."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

The next morning at 5:00 AM, Sasuke and Sakura arrived at Training Ground 7 to find Naruto snoozing in a hammock.

Sakura wanted to scream at him, but Naruto raised his arm and pointed at a tree where two more hammocks were hanging, folded.

"Grab a hammock and set it up," he drawled. "Kakashi Hatake is always at least three hours late to everything. Catch up on some sleep. He told us to be here, he didn't say we had to be awake the whole time."

"Hn." The ever eloquent Sasuke managed to compress a sense of disdain, boredom, arrogance, and a little bit of sleepiness into a single syllable.

Sakura, somehow not understanding Sasuke's grunt, was about to scream at Naruto when the lounging blonde yawned in a most relaxing manner. It was contagious… Sasuke and Sakura yawned simultaneously.

Inner Sakura pumped her fist. _CHA! Sasuke and I even yawn at the same time! HOW ROMANTIC!_

Outer Sakura had a different thought, as evidenced by her blush. "Sasuke… do you want to... share a hammock?"

"No." Sasuke ambled over and grabbed one of the hammocks, setting it up a small distance away from Naruto.

Naruto didn't want any more trouble from Sakura. So he yawned again. It was a bit fake, but it worked. Sakura yawned again... then sighed and grabbed the last hammock.

Five hours later, Kakashi arrived in a swirl of leaves.

He found his three students sitting around a portable charcoal grill, munching on kebabs.

"I thought I told you not to each breakfast."

"This is lunch," said Naruto. "Who eats kebabs for breakfast?"

Kakashi silently acknowledged the point.

Naruto sprinkled seasoning over the kebabs roasting on the grill. A delicious smell wafted towards Kakashi. "Want one? This one's done." Naruto lifted a kebab skewer with his tongs.

"Thanks," said Kakashi, reaching for it.

"Ah-ah-ah!" said Naruto, moving the kebab away from Kakashi's hand. "We haven't passed the hidden teamwork test yet. Can't have it unless we're a team."

Kakashi considered the fact that Naruto already knew what the test was about. He looked towards Sakura and Sasuke, who were munching on their kebabs and watching the interaction with interest. He looked towards the skewer of perfectly-grilled meat and vegetables Naruto was holding. His stomach growled.

"Fine. You pass."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

That night, Naruto went home to his crappy apartment. After closing and locking the door, he went still for a moment. Then he ate a cup of ramen and went to bed. Or rather, his shadow clone did.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Deep underground in a well-furnished office, Naruto arrived and sat on the couch in a meditation position.

"Report!" he barked.

A medium-tall brunette in a delivery uniform walked into the office.

"Whirlwind Postal Service is still making a killing, weekly profits are up by 1.5%. We're still having trouble breaking into the large-shipments market, civilians don't seem to trust us so easily when they can't see how their stuff is leaving the store. As you know, the main competitor in the Water Country area is Gato Shipping. Gato's rates are suspiciously low for their methods of moving cargo. We recommend having the spy division look into them, maybe they're into drugs or something. Negotiations with the Land of Vegetables are going well, the daimyo seems to like the idea of selling produce to remote locations at luxury prices, so we expect to have an office there up and running the next month or so. Land of Tea seems a little more reluctant, they're used to the existing shipping companies, but once again we're hoping to entice them with speedy service to remote locations."

"Good work. Dispel."

The brunette disappeared in a poof of white smoke. Naruto closed his eyes and processed the memories for two minutes before he opened them again. He made a cross-shaped hand seal, and the man in the delivery uniform reappeared silently, without even a wisp of smoke. The man turned around and Naruto slapped a seal paper on the back of his neck, which instantly glowed and sank into his skin. The man bowed and left the room.

"Next!" commanded Naruto.

A short figure stalked from the shadows, wearing a stereotypical ninja costume, everything covered in black except for the eyes, which were a nondescript brown. The figure knelt, one hand on his tanto and the other in a fist on the ground, in a stereotypical "reporting ninja" pose.

"Spy ring continues to avoid suspicion. Clones enrolled in Shinobi Academies of Kumo, Iwa, Kiri and Suna just finished their second year, situation nominal, all have scored somewhere in the middle of the pack. The two Chūnin clones we inserted in Kiri's rebel forces report that the rebellion continues to grow in size. We project that Mei Terumi will become Mizukage within the next one to three years. Still no progress finding Utakata, rumors indicate that he's still the host of the six-tailed slug. Jiraya was sighted yesterday in Rice, we suspect he's having the same problem we are getting spies into Oto, all of Orochimaru's bases are sealed and underground, we can't slip in anything bigger than a fly."

"Okay, gotta tell the training group to practice using Henge with a fly form. It's just freaking difficult to use the wings in that form. Thank you, you can dispel."

After sending a "new" spymaster clone out, Naruto asked for the training team leader. This one was an identical clone of Naruto.

"Yo boss, what's up? Here's the empty chakra storage seals. You ready?"

Naruto sat in his meditation pose, closed his eyes, and nodded. The clone dispelled, and after five minutes Naruto smiled. He picked up the stack of chakra storage seals and channeled a huge amount of chakra into each of them. Good thing he had suppression seals on the entire underground facility, otherwise this would have prompted some serious digging (literally) from that prick, Danzo. Naruto LOVED fuinjutsu.

After sending a new training clone out with the stack of seals, Naruto called for the last group leader. A pretty auburn-haired girl, appearing about 17 years old, walked into the room.

"Everything's going well with the apprentices. I've got three new Akimichi recipes since last week. Riku is still watching the master metalsmith working on chakra-conductive metal, hasn't been allowed to touch the valuable stuff. Sara, the bank teller, is still bored out of her mind. And Sora got to work with some stained glass in the construction company, so he learned something new."

"Thanks Yui."

"One more thing," said the clone. "I think we should learn to dance. It might be useful for infiltration. And not just at formal parties. Could be useful on seduction missions."

"Hmm, I see your point. Do you want to add it to your daily schedule? I think you have time in the day after your restaurant shift ends. I can create a new male identity to learn the mens' dance steps."

"Yup, sounds good."

With that, Yui dispelled. Naruto wouldn't re-spawn her until the next morning, no use in making a clone to collect memories of sleeping. Sleeping as a girl was weird anyway, even though he'd gotten used to it.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

As Naruto got ready to sleep in his luxurious queen-sized bed, he remembered the second chapter of his father's book that he had first read four years ago.

Chapter 2: Secrets and Lies: How to Hide Your Skills and Avoid Paperwork

Ninja keep secrets. Everyone knows this. For some reason, a lot of ninja ignore this.

For a ninja, EVERYTHING is classified. Your favorite food. Where you sleep at night. Your favorite hobbies. Which girl you have a crush on. And most importantly, your skills, abilities, and jutsu.

There are at least four reasons for this:

The obvious one: you want to surprise your enemies.

Anything your enemies know about you can be used against you.

Contrary to popular belief, having a big Bingo Book bounty is a bad thing. Why the hell would anybody want half the ninja world trying to cut off your head? This isn't One Piece.

If your allies know how powerful you are, they'll give you responsibilities. Responsibilities aren't bad, but they come with paperwork. Paperwork is pure evil.

Let me expand on that last point. As Kushina says, paperwork was invented by Yami in order to get revenge when Kami gave us ramen. In fact, you know how I became the Yondaime Hokage? That was a mistake. The instant I got sworn in as Hokage, I got buried under 5 metric tons of paperwork. And the village council, they're the ones who give me all the paperwork! Every time I complain they just smile and give me more. I'm convinced that it's a conspiracy by Iwa and Kumo to assassinate me with paperwork! My training time has been cut to a quarter of what it used to be since I became Hokage! And my favorite jutsu, Kage Bunshin, is hardly any use, because different pieces of paperwork are all related to each other and you can't even parallelize the paperwork into more than three different processors or so. I almost wish I had let Iwa win the war rather than revealing my abilities with Hiraishin and becoming known as the strongest fighter in the village. We could have made Jiraya the Hokage. I could have a nice cushy position on the village council, laughing at ero-sensei and sending him pieces of bullshit paperwork with horribly drawn sketches of gay porn in the margins. Fuck it, I could actually go on a honeymoon with my lovely wife Kushina.

Hmm… Kushina's pregnant. Maybe I can convince our baby that being Hokage would be awesome and fun. Then I can dump the job on him when he's like 16 or 18, and I can spend the rest of my days making baby siblings for him with Kushina.

Note that "Classified" does not mean "No one can know of this." You will need to trust your teammates about many of your abilities in order to work well as a team. And you'll need to be honest with your friends and family in order to keep them as friends and family, though a lot of the time you can actually cop out by being vague or straight-up telling them you don't want to say. Just make sure your teammates, friends, and family can keep secrets, and make sure they know that everything about you is a secret.

Aaaannny-way… How To Keep Secrets.

 **Section (a). Henge is Your Best Friend.**

Henge no Jutsu (Transformation Technique) is known as an E-rank jutsu for disguising yourself as another person.

This is stupid. What Henge actually does is transform your physical body into a different shape and color. _Any_ shape and color. Yes, that means you can transform into objects or animals. Technically even liquids or gases, though this is extremely dangerous unless done by a Shadow Clone (more on Shadow Clones in Chapter 3). And get this, while you're under a Henge, you remain fully awake and aware of your surroundings, though if you're transformed into an object, you might not be able to see. On the other hand, if you're transformed into an animal with excellent eyesight, you'll be able to see better than ever, and your other senses can be improved as well.

Note that it takes a lot of time and effort to be able to use any animal form. For example, if you were to Henge into a horse, you'd have to learn to walk with four long, gangly legs. You don't get the instincts of the animal you transform into. And you have to learn each animal form separately.

You can also transform yourself into a bigger, stronger person, and you'll get physical strength. Note that this is usually not worthwhile because changing your size significantly takes extra chakra, and you have to continuously expend chakra to maintain that form, so you might as well be simply channeling chakra to your muscles and bones to make yourself stronger (see Chapter 7, "Chakra Makes Everything Better"). However, if you need to increase or decrease your weight, Henge is perfect.

That's why I consider a well-mastered Henge to be an S-rank jutsu.

Anyway, hand seals are Dog → Boar → Ram, channel your chakra while focusing on an image of yourself in a different form.

Use Henge whenever you visit the library to prevent people from knowing what you're studying. Use Henge when practicing Ninjutsu so no one knows what you're capable of. Use Henge when carrying out missions in enemy territory so no one knows who did it (that's how you avoid a Bingo Book bounty).

 **Section (b). Disguising Your Jutsu.**

There will be times when you need to use ninjutsu openly. If you're anything like me, you'll have an aptitude for high-level ninjutsu, which tend to be flashy in the extreme. This is dangerous because it can get you a reputation for being powerful… which sucks, as we've already discussed. Still, if you want to protect your loved ones, sometimes you'll have to act openly.

Ninjutsu Rule Number 1: Don't shout the name of your technique. That's just stupid. Not only does it warn your enemy of what's coming, it actually slows down your jutsu. Yes, it might help you focus, but thinking the name in your head is just as good. And if it's one of those "breathing fire" type jutsus, you can actually choke on your own words. Gack.

Ninjutsu Rule Number 2: Practice your jutsu until you can form and release the necessary chakra without hand seals. You haven't mastered a jutsu until you can do this. You can spit out jutsu faster, it's impossible for your opponent to see what's coming, it can't be copied by the Sharingan, and it's just badass.

Just think, if your control is good enough, you can shout "Katon: Gokakyu no Jutsu (Fire Release: Great Fireball)" while shooting out a lightning bolt. Your opponent will throw up an earth wall or a water barrier, which would be a perfect defense against fire, but far less effective against lightning.

Note that the Byakugan can see chakra being formed even without hand seals. The Hyuuga doujutsu can't copy techniques, and in fact the Hyuuga rarely use ninjutsu at all, but it makes it hard to surprise them. Good thing they're on our side.

 **Section (c). Learning in Secret.**

Build yourself an underground training facility using Doton (Earth Release) techniques. Make it deep and big, and cover it with security seals (see Chapter 11 for fuinjutsu). Use Shadow Clones to keep people from noticing you're missing.

If you're on a Genin team, you may need to let your Jōnin sensei and your teammates into this facility for training.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Author's Notes:

Please review!

Next chapter: "If You're Not Cheating, You're Not a Ninja." Team 7 goes on missions! See what Naruto does with Tora...


	3. Chapter 3: Cheating

Author's Note: I updated one of the warnings at the top of Chapter 1: Naruto is OP, but only for a twelve-year-old. S-ranked ninja are a credible threat to him in a fair fight. He will not go around curb-stomping the Sage of Six Paths or the Shinigami, that would be against all common sense.

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any of the characters in this story.

Chapter 3: If You're Not Cheating, You're Not a Ninja

"Team 7, here for a D-rank mission," chirped Kakashi. He never got tired of his students' reaction to D-ranks.

"Here are the available missions," said the Chūnin in charge of handing out D-ranks. "Painting a fence, chasing groundhogs out of a farmer's field, cleaning the Inuzuka dog kennels, capturing Madam Shijimi's missing cat..."

"That one," Kakashi pointed at the last scroll. "We'll take the Tora mission."

"Ah," said the Chūnin, amusement flashing across his face. "Here you go."

"Alright, my cute little Genin, we've got an exciting find-and-capture mission! Let's go!"

Thanks to Kakashi's mask, you couldn't tell whether his eye-smile was part of a genuine happy-smile or if it was a sadistic grin.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Psst, Tora." Naruto snuck up to the cat without any intention of capturing it or harming it, or even touching it in any way. The intelligent cat couldn't sense any killing intent whatsoever, so it didn't run.

"Mrow?" Tora backed away, cautious.

"How about a deal?" said Naruto. "Would you like to learn to climb trees?"

"Mrooow," said Tora.

"Okay, you can already climb trees. But I can teach you to climb up and down trees like a squirrel! Watch." Naruto set a foot on the side of a tree and walked up the vertical surface and back down to the ground.

"Meerrrrw..."

"The deal is, if I teach you this, you come quietly whenever my team gets a mission to find and capture you."

"Mrow!" said Tora. Not good enough.

"Also, I can teach you how to walk on water."

"Mrrrow?"

"Yes, really. Just imagine, you're running from a Genin team and you run across a river… they'll be flabbergasted! And most of them couldn't follow you."

"Mrrrr...ow."

"Cool, it's a deal." Naruto shook the cat's paw. "Heheheheh, this is gonna be fun."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Naruto walked out of the woods with Tora sprawled on his head, mirroring the way Kiba Inuzuka carried his dog Akamaru.

"Naruto, how did you find Tora so fast?" Kakashi had to keep his disappointment from showing.

"Huh? Tora's a nice cat," stated Naruto, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "Hey Sakura, wanna hold him? He likes to be scratched behind the ears, but be sure not to squeeze him. He really hates being squashed."

Team 7 walked into the missions office with Tora purring in Sakura's arms.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Kakashi was in a bar, trying to pick up women. Of course, given his choice of reading material and the fact that he was reading it in the open and giggling pervertedly, he wasn't going to be successful anytime in the next century.

Guy Might was in a bar, trying to pick up women. Of course, given his choice of haircut and clothing, he wasn't going to be successful anytime in the next decade. Why the difference in success rate? Guy was actually paying attention to the people around him.

Then Guy noticed Kakashi, and both of them stopped trying to pick up women. No, I didn't mean it _that_ way.

"YOSH! MY ETERNAL RIVAL! DID YOU HEAR?! MADAM SHIJIMI'S CAT TORA HAS BECOME EVEN MORE YOUTHFUL! ASUMA'S TEAM ACTUALLY FAILED THE MISSION YESTERDAY!"

"Hmm? Guy, did you say something?"

"ALWAYS SO HIP AND COOL, KAKASHI! I PROPOSE A CHALLENGE! WHOEVER'S GENIN TEAM CAN CAPTURE TORA FASTER IS THE WINNER! IF MY TEAM DOES NOT WIN, I WILL RUN ONE THOUSAND LAPS AROUND KONOHA ON MY THUMBS! AND IF I CANNOT DO THAT, I WILL CLIMB THE HOKAGE MOUNTAIN FIVE THOUSAND TIMES ON ONE FOOT! AND IF I CANNOT DO THAT..."

"I accept."

"...wait, what?"

"I accept."

"YOSH! KAKASHI, MY ETERNAL RIVAL, YOU ARE OVERFLOWING WITH YOUTH TODAY! I WILL DO FIVE HUNDRED CRUNCHES IN HONOR OF THIS OCCASION!"

The next day, Guy's team set a new record for the Recapture Tora mission: they dashed back into the missions room with a very much cowed and bedraggled cat in twenty-three minutes.

The day after that, Kakashi's team accepted the mission. Naruto walked into the forest and called for Tora. The cat ran up to Naruto, climbed his back, and perched on his shoulder. They casually strolled back into the missions room with a new record: three minutes.

"YOSH! I MUST KNOW THIS MOST YOUTHFUL YOUNG MAN'S NAME! I AM GUY MIGHT, KONOHA'S BEAUTIFUL GREEN BEAST! MAY I KNOW YOUR NAME?"

"I'm Naruto Uzumaki… it's… nice to meet you."

"I CANNOT BELIEVE IT! I HAVE FOUND SOMEONE EVEN MORE HIP AND COOL THAN MY ETERNAL RIVAL KAKASHI!"

"…people don't say 'hip' anymore."

Kakashi never accepted the "Recapture Tora" mission again. He wasn't one to mess with success. Besides, it just wasn't as fun when his students were as bored as he was.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Almost two months after Academy Graduation Day, Team 7 walked into the missions room and Sasuke spoke up.

"Give us a C-ranked mission. No more of these… plebeian chores."

Sakura was quick to interject, "Yes! Sasuke dear deserves better! Give us a C-ranked mission."

The Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi, happened to be in the missions office that day, as he occasionally was, since he assigned the higher-ranked missions personally. He asked, "Are you sure you're ready for a C-ranked mission? You know that you may be required to fight bandits on C-ranks."

"Hn," said Sasuke. "I'm ready."

Sakura looked less sure. Then she perked up. "Of course I'm ready! And if I'm not, Sasuke will protect me."

Naruto said, "Personally, I'm ready. As a team?" he looked towards Sakura and shrugged. It was obvious.

A village council member, an old woman named Koharu, also "just happened" to be in the missions office that day – which was _very_ unusual. "Oh," said Koharu, ignoring Naruto, "Let Lord Uchiha go on a C-ranked mission. I'm sure he's more than ready."

"Hmm," said Hiruzen diplomatically. "Well, it's Kakashi's decision as their sensei."

Koharu stopped smiling at Sasuke and glared at Kakashi.

Kakashi sighed, "Give us a C-ranked mission."

"Very well," said Hiruzen. He handed a scroll to Kakashi. "It's a protection detail for a bridge builder named Tazuna. You're to escort him to the country of Wave and protect him until his bridge is finished. Send him in."

The smell of stale booze preceded Tazuna into the room. Koharu grimaced and left.

"Okay. - _hic_ \- Where are the super ninja that are gonna - _hic_ \- protect me?"

"Tazuna," said Hiruzen, "This is Team 7, they'll protect you on your way to Wave."

"These - _hic_ \- brats? They don't look so tough. I asked for super ninja, not - _hic_ \- tetchy little brats!"

Naruto leaned forward, a blank look on his face. The room grew colder. Tazuna suddenly sobered up and started sweating.

"Tetchy little brats..." said Naruto in a monotone.

"I… uh, actually, you do look like super ninja..."

The room was suddenly warm again. Birds chirped, and the refreshing summer breeze blew through the room. There was even a butterfly, which made Hiruzen do a double-take.

"By the way," said Naruto offhandedly, as if the last fifteen seconds did not occur, "you're building a bridge? Where's this bridge connecting to?"

"Yeah, it's gonna be a super bridge! It's connecting the island of Wave to the main continent."

"So this protection mission… you're being threatened by Gato's mercenaries."

Hiruzen and Kakashi each raised an eyebrow. Tazuna started sweating again.

"Who's Gato?" asked Sakura.

"Oh," explained Naruto, "Just the biggest shipping magnate in the area. He's known for having the lowest prices for large shipments. So low, in fact, that they couldn't possibly cover the costs of running his ships – you know what that means. And then there's the fact that he more or less took over Wave six months ago. There's no proof, but everyone seems to agree that he was involved in the disappearance of their Daimyo. Which makes sense, given that Gato is living in the Daimyo's mansion. He's got a large collection of mercenaries and basically thugs acting as bodyguards."

"Hmm. Naruto, how do you know this?" asked Kakashi.

"Overheard it from someone working for that new Whirlwind Postal company. I guess they keep tabs on their competitors."

 _Nice work, Naruto_ , thought Hiruzen. _You're finally showing signs of your father's intelligence. I suppose_ _bandits and thugs_ _still within the parameters of a C-ranked mission. I had hoped to give them a nice easy protection detail, since Sakura isn't ready for any kind of fighting, but maybe this will serve as a wake-up call._

 _I may have underestimated Naruto_ , thought Kakashi. _To put all those facts together that quickly, he's smarter than he appears to be._ _That and the whole Genin test with the barbecue... now that I know Sasuke and Sakura better, Naruto must have done some serious manipulation to get them to eat his food._

Breaking out of his thoughts, Kakashi said, "Very well. Prepare for a month-long mission. We'll meet at the gates of Konoha tomorrow morning at 7:00 am."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Team 7 was walking out of the Hokage tower after receiving their mission.

"Sasuke," said Naruto, "Be more careful about asking that Koharu for favors."

"Hn. What makes you think I did that?"

Naruto shrugged. "It's not that. Did you see that smile she gave you? She's pedo."

Sakura's eyes widened when she heard this. Sakura would tell Ino. Ino would tell her dad. Ino's dad would tell Shikamaru's dad, Choji's dad, Ibiki Morino, and Anko Mitarashi. Shikamaru's dad would tell his son. Choji's dad would also tell his son. Ibiki would keep it to himself. Anko would tell everyone in all the dango stands and sake bars of Konoha. It would be an entire week before the story was displaced by a new, juicier rumor. Konoha's gossips would soon forget, but Sasuke's fangirls would forever class old woman Koharu as "competition".

* * *

– CS –

* * *

At 6:55am the next day, Naruto strolled up to the gate, where Sasuke and Sakura were waiting.

"Hi guys," said Naruto.

"Naruto? You're… not wearing orange," remarked Sakura.

"That's right, I'm... not wearing orange," stated Naruto. He was, in fact, wearing a mostly gray outfit that was rather tight, showing his lean physique and wiry muscles. His dark gray cargo pants were taped at the ankle and his long-sleeved shirt had several pockets for storage scrolls. He wore fingerless gloves with metal plates on the backs of the palms. He had a standard kunai pouch, but other than that he didn't have a pack.

"Hn," said Sasuke. They fell into silence.

Five minutes later, Kakashi arrived at the gate with a sober Tazuna at 7:00am. "You're… not late," said an extremely surprised Sakura.

"Hn," said Sasuke in a surprised tone. Apparently he was back to monosyllables.

"Hn," said Naruto, copying Sasuke.

"Hn?" asked Tazuna, wondering why everyone was saying "Hn."

"WHY IS EVERYBODY ACTING OUT OF CHARACTER TODAY?! Except Sasuke dear, he's normal."

"Brats," said Tazuna.

"Let's move out," said Kakashi.

Five hours later found the team trudging along at a civilian pace, in a formation with Tazuna in the middle, Sasuke in front, Naruto on the right, Sakura on the left, and Kakashi in back.

Naruto made discreet hand signs to Kakashi with his left hand: _Two ninja in puddle ahead._ He turned to Tazuna and made a comment about the travel distance so he could see Kakashi's reply from the corner of his eye.

Kakashi blinked. Those were ANBU hand signs! Maybe the Hokage had taught Naruto? The two were known to be close. Mentally shaking his head, Kakashi signed back: _Acknowledged_.

Naruto pulled out a small bottle with a skull on it. He signed: _Have antidote. Go ahead?_

Kakashi blinked again. _Go ahead_ , he signed.

Naruto unscrewed the cap of the bottle and lobbed it into the puddle which was now 10 meters away.

"Naruto, what'd you do that for?" asked Sakura accusingly.

"Triangle formation! Protect the client!" barked Kakashi.

Two masked ninja appeared from the puddle, spluttering and coughing. Kakashi was there in a flash, sweeping their feet from under them and tying them up.

"The Demon Brothers of Kiri, Gozu and Meizu. Chūnin level missing-nin. Sasuke, Sakura, stay with the client. Naruto?"

Naruto stepped forward. "You're dying," he said to the two trussed up men. "Feel that burning in your lungs? Once that poison works its way through your lungs and into your bloodstream, it will start to affect your nervous system. Your entire body will soon feel like it's on fire and your head will feel like the hangover after an entire week on a drinking binge. It'll take between five and seven days for you to die. And the only antidote is the one I have sealed in my pack."

"So…" said Kakashi, "If you want the antidote, you'll talk. Who are you targeting?"

"You bastards. Fine. The bridge builder, Tazuna. Gato wants him dead."

"Who else has Gato hired?" demanded Kakashi.

"We don't know."

"Hmm. They're not lying. Any other questions, team?"

Naruto had one. "Yeah, which one are you? Gozu or Meizu?"

"Seriously? …I'm Gozu," said the one who had spoken first.

"Alright," said Kakashi. He pulled out two pieces of seal paper and drew something on them, then slapped them on the backs of the prisoners' necks. "Chakra disruption seals. We'll leave them here for ANBU to pick up after I send a message to Lord Hokage. Naruto, the antidote?"

Naruto grinned, "Just a paralyzing poison mixed with pepper spray. It'll wear off in a few hours, depending on how much they inhaled."

The Demon Brothers cursed. Kakashi chuckled and eye-smiled.

Sasuke had a different reaction. "Dead-last. Where did you get the poison. I demand you give it to me."

"You can buy paralyzing poison in any shinobi outfitter. You can find pepper spray in a grocery store. And why should I give you my stuff?"

"I'm an Uchiha. It's my right."

"What, the great Uchiha clan is too poor to pay for basic supplies?" taunted Naruto.

Meizu snorted, "That Uchiha, he's a real worthless brat, isn't he?"

Sasuke glared at Meizu.

"What, is that supposed to be killing intent? My ex's mother had better killing intent. And she was a civilian."

Sasuke pulled out a kunai and growled.

"Now, now, Sasuke, put that away," ordered Kakashi. "The T&I Department needs them alive."

Sasuke fell back to what he knew. He said, "Hn."

"So, Tazuna..." Kakashi said, falsely cheery. Then his tone changed. "When were you going to tell us you had ninja after you?"

* * *

– CS –

* * *

After a sob story from Tazuna and a warning about a probable upcoming fight with a Jōnin from Kakashi, Team 7 decided to continue with their mission. They crossed the channel in a boat and made their way towards Tazuna's house. This time, Kakashi was in front and Naruto was in the back, with Sasuke and Sakura in the middle.

"LOOK OUT!" shouted Kakashi. Naruto dove forward and grabbed Sakura and Tazuna, shoving them to the ground.

A giant cleaver blade came spinning out of the mist and over their heads where they had been a moment ago. It embedded itself in a tree, and on top of the blade a fierce-looking man appeared.

"Triangle formation!" shouted Kakashi again. "Protect the client! This one's out of your league."

The two Jōnin named each other in a reverse introduction.

"Kakashi of the Sharingan."

"Zabuza Momochi, Missing Nin from Kiri."

"What's with the grandstanding, are you a samurai?" asked Naruto. "I thought samurai would be a bit less… y'know, shirtless. Are you broke?"

Zabuza chuckled. "Kid has a point. Let's see how you deal with this! Kirigakure (Hidden Mist) no Jutsu!" Zabuza raised a thick mist, vanishing into it.

Powerful killing intent hit Team 7 and Tazuna. Sakura froze completely. Sasuke, shaking, started to raise his kunai to his throat.

"Sasuke!" said Kakashi. "Calm down. I'll protect you with my life, all of you. I will not allow my comrades to die. Trust me."

Naruto took a deep breath and thought, _Fūton: Daitoppa (Wind Release: Great Breakthrough)!_ He blew a powerful stream of wind blew at Zabuza's last known location, producing a stiff wind everywhere that blew the mist away.

There were three Zabuza's hiding in that mist.

Naruto threw a spread of kunai at one who was dashing towards the team's triangle formation. The kunai were blocked with a swipe of the sword, but the element of surprise was lost. The second attempting to sneak up on Kakashi, who faced it with a kunai. The third was standing by the trees observing, but immediately started to make hand signs.

Three Naruto clones appeared beside Naruto, with no hand signs or warning. Two of them vanished in splashes of water, and at the same time, two of the Zabuza's turned into water with a puff of white smoke above each one, revealing that the real Zabuza was the one standing by the trees making hand signs. Naruto handed a sealing tag to the remaining clone, who vanished in a puff of smoke and Kawarimi'd with the real Zabuza's sword, which was attached to his back. It slapped the tag on the back of Zabuza's neck, and Naruto made a single hand sign, channeling chakra to the seal and causing it to sink into his skin.

Zabuza stopped making hand signs, spun around, and kicked out at the Naruto clone, dispersing it in a puff of smoke.

"Shadow clones," he growled. "Don't think that'll stop me." Then Zabuza fell over, unable to move.

"Chakra Disruption and Paralysis Seal," said Naruto to Kakashi. "He's not moving until I take that off."

Suddenly a short ninja with a Kiri hunter-nin mask dropped beside Zabuza.

"Thank you for taking out my prey," said the apparent hunter-nin. "I will take him back to Kiri for interrogation."

"Hold it!" shouted Naruto. He threw a kunai at the newcomer.

It was too late, the apparent hunter-nin disappeared with Zabuza in a Shunshin (Body Flicker).

"Naruto!" said Kakashi. "That was a Kiri hunter-nin! You shouldn't have attacked him!"

Naruto shook his head, "There ARE no Kiri hunter-nin. All of the Mizukage's forces are tied up fighting that rebellion of theirs. Besides, a real hunter-nin would have just cut off Zabuza's head, right?"

"…You're right," said Kakashi. "He should have cut off Zabuza's head and destroyed the body right there. But how do you know about the Kiri civil war?"

"I'm a ninja," deadpanned Naruto, as if that explained everything.

"Hmm. Alright, is everyone okay? No injuries?"

Tazuna took a deep breath. "I'm fine," he said, giving a thumbs up. "That was a super fight!"

Sasuke relaxed, taking a long breath and trying to hide that he was doing so.

"Dead-last," said Sasuke in his "high-and-mighty" voice, "What was that technique, shadow clones? Teach it to me."

Naruto shook his head. "You wanna take this one, Sensei?"

Kakashi sighed. "Shadow clones are a B-rank Forbidden Technique. Sasuke, you don't have enough chakra to use shadow clones right now. If you tried it, best case, you'd end up with severe chakra exhaustion. Worst case, you could die."

Sakura finally unfroze. "Then… how come Naruto can perform it?" She sounded a lot less confident than usual.

"I'm a ninja," said Naruto, stopping Kakashi from giving a half-answer.

"And what is that supposed to mean, idiot?" demanded Sasuke.

"It means I don't tell my secrets to people I don't trust and respect. And right now, the two of you fit in neither category."

Sakura would have punched Naruto in the head, but she was still feeling out of it due to Zabuza's killing intent. "Then… how did you take out Zabuza's clones so quickly?" asked Sakura. "They just… disappeared."

"Let's just say it's something only shadow clones can do," stated Naruto. It was true. His shadow clones had simply Kawarimi'd with the water clones' heads, which was almost a suicide technique because it left the clones' feet fused with the water clone's body, dispersing both clones. A normal ninja would require an incredible amount of chakra control to avoid fusing with the clone's body, like Tsunade-level chakra control. And it wasn't possible to use Kawarimi with a real human being's head. On the other hand, it was very useful for identifying a real person and proving that the third Zabuza wasn't just another clone. And shadow clones were the only clone type that could perform ninjutsu, which allowed them to use a whole range of self-destructive techniques like this one.

Naruto changed the subject by picking up Zabuza's giant cleaver blade from where his clone had left it after using Kawarimi with the sword. "Kubikiribōchō," he said, giving it a couple of experimental swings. "Interesting weapon, unfortunately not my style. I think I'll keep it anyway. Unless you want it, Sensei?"

Kakashi was surprised that Naruto could swing the sword like that. Either the sword was lighter than it looked, or Naruto was stronger than he appeared. "No," said Kakashi, "Not really my style either."

"Okay," said Naruto. He pulled a storage scroll out of one of his pockets, unrolled it, and lay the sword on top of it.

"Hold on," said Sakura, "Give it to Sasuke."

Naruto snorted and hefted the giant blade by its center of gravity with one hand, offering the handle to Sasuke.

"Hn," said Sasuke. He had to look cool, so he tried to grab the sword with one hand.

When Naruto let go of the sword, Sasuke dropped it on the ground, jumping back to keep it from landing on his toes. He couldn't even hold up one end of the sword.

 _So it's not that the sword is light,_ thought Kakashi.

Naruto snickered, "Let's just say Sasuke's... more of a speed-type fighter. Sakura, you wanna try it too? Think you're stronger than Sasuke?"

"Of course not!" said Sakura. "How do you think I'd look, swinging around an ugly thing like that!"

"Mah, mah," temporized Kakashi. "Let's move on. Tazuna, we're about twenty minutes away from your house, right?"

Naruto grabbed the sword – with one hand – and sealed it into his storage scroll.

 _Naruto_ , thought Sasuke, _How did you get so strong?_

* * *

– CS –

* * *

That evening, Kakashi pulled Naruto aside. "Do you know how long Zabuza will be out thanks to that seal?"

"It's locked to my chakra signature, so it would take a real sealing master to outright remove the seal. The chakra I channeled into it, for someone of Zabuza's strength, should last at least a week, possibly two. The paralysis will wear off a couple days before the chakra disruption effects are completely gone."

"Good. Now, where did you learn the Shadow Clone Technique?"

"I read it in a book."

"Where did you get this book?"

"The library. Here, I've got a copy." Naruto pulled out his father's book and showed it to Kakashi. The "ignore me" genjutsu took effect… Kakashi changed the subject.

"I think we'll do some training for the next week. Let's tell the team."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

How to be a Ninja  
 _by Minato Namikaze_

Chapter 3: If You're Not Cheating, You're Not a Ninja

Ninja cheat, lie, steal, and use deception and stealth. That's what sets us apart from Samurai.

When you're up against an enemy, strike without warning when they least expect it. Use every advantage and every dirty trick you can to your maximum benefit. There's very little honor in war, and you have none to spare for your enemies.

 **Section (a): Uber Hax: Shadow Clones**

Shadow Clones are, without exception, the greatest invention known to mankind. Here's why.

The Shadow Clone Jutsu is listed as a B-rank Forbidden Technique due to its chakra requirements. It divides your chakra evenly among the shadow clones you make. Each Shadow Clone is a physical, touchable construct made of your chakra. This has three effects. One, Shadow Clones can use ninjutsu. Two, after a Shadow Clone disperses, the remaining chakra returns to your body, bringing with it the memories of the clone's "life". And three, if you don't have enough chakra, using the Shadow Clone Jutsu can give you extreme chakra exhaustion, or possibly even kill you.

So, to learn the Shadow Clone Jutsu, the first thing you need to do is raise your level of chakra reserves. See Chapter 8: "How to Gain More Chakra" for more on this. You'll need at least high-Chūnin level reserves in order to safely make a single Shadow Clone. In other words, when you can do the Water Walking chakra control exercise at the same time as Leaf Sticking and Kunai Spinning, and hold all three of them for one hour straight without a break, you should have enough chakra for a Shadow Clone. Or you can just use a fuinjutsu seal from the appendix of this book to find out how much chakra you have.

Once you've learned Shadow Clones, you can use them to cheat with your training. Remember that second effect? It turns out that your Shadow Clones can learn practically anything, including reading books, learning ninjutsu and fuinjutsu, even practice chakra control techniques, and their experiences will be tranferred back to you. Once you have a significant number of Shadow Clones training this way, it TOTALLY feels like cheating, because you're learning many times faster than the average ninja can learn.

And you can use them to help increase your chakra capacity. By dividing your chakra, you can exercise your body when you're mostly empty of chakra, increasing the rate at which you generate it. You can also make clones, wait until your chakra recovers, then disperse your clones. When your clones disperse, their chakra returns to your system, giving you a bit of an overload and "stretching" your chakra system. Kisame Hoshigaki, one of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist, has a sword that uses the same principle to increase his chakra capacity. Beware that rapidly increasing your chakra capacity in this way will naturally reduce your chakra control, so be sure to keep doing those control exercises. With Shadow Clones, of course.

One more thing: ever hear about forbidden suicide techniques? Yeah, due to the fact that Shadow Clones can use ninjutsu, they can use almost all of the self-destructive forbidden jutsu out there. Just avoid anything that involves your soul.

Now remember, this is a trade secret. If other ninja learn about this, it will eventually get to our enemies, which will result in stronger enemy ninja coming after us.

 **Section (b): When to be Honorable**

Honor actually does have its place for ninja. You need to be careful to distinguish between family, friends, allies, and enemies. Family are those you trust completely. Friends are those you trust and have respect for. Allies are those whom circumstances allow you to trust, but may not be trustworthy forever. Show honor to your family, friends and allies, but not your enemies. You can tell your secrets to your family and friends, but not your allies. Tell nothing to your enemies.

Don't get any ideas about slowing down to let your friends keep pace with you. At times, your friends will get curious about your secrets – the honorable way to handle this is to openly tell them that yes, you have secrets, but no, you're not going to tell them everything. If they're really your friends, they'll accept this.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Author's Notes:

I'd like to state that I will NOT be writing out every chapter of Minato's book. Some chapters of his book will contain standard canon information, and for those I'll just give you a table of contents.


	4. Chapter 4: Real Ninja Don't Fight

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any of the characters in this story.

Author's Note: I made an edit to Naruto's "mission report" to the Hokage. He no longer hints that Sasuke activated his Sharingan… that didn't happen in the initial Zabuza fight in canon, so it didn't happen in this story… besides, Sasuke's Sharingan gets activated in a much more amusing way in Chapter 7.

 **Chapter 4: Real Ninja Don't Fight: Real Ninja Just Win**

"Okay, kiddies," said Kakashi, "Zabuza will be back in a week or two, and this time he'll most likely have an ally. We're going to do some training."

Team 7 found a nice secluded spot in the forest near Tazuna's house.

With a dramatic flourish, Kakashi announced, "I'm going to teach you how to climb trees."

"But sensei," objected Sakura, "We can already climb trees. Even Naruto can climb trees."

Kakashi raised an eyebrow, but ignored the last statement. "Ah, but can you do it like this?"

He walked up the side of a tree on his feet, treating the vertical surface as if it were horizontal. He reached a thick branch and stood upside-down on the underside of the branch.

"Wow," said Sakura.

"Hn," said Sasuke.

"Boring," said Naruto. "My way is better."

"Well," Kakashi interrupted before Sasuke could comment, "why don't you show us, Naruto?"

Sticking his hands in his pockets, Naruto jumped on the side of a tree, twisting his body so that he faced the ground. Still keeping his hands in his pockets, he moonwalked up the tree. "See? Much cooler."

"Hmm," said Kakashi. He somersaulted back to the ground, landing lightly. Then he copied Naruto, moonwalking up the tree. "It's a bit more difficult, but I can do it too. And I look cooler doing it than you do."

Sakura nodded enthusiastically. She definitely thought Kakashi looked cooler.

Naruto cartwheeled gracefully back to the ground.

Kakashi cartwheeled gracefully back to the ground.

"Copycat," pouted Naruto.

"Copy-nin," stated Kakashi. "Alright, Sakura, Sasuke, start by going forwards. Best to start with a bit of a run. Use a kunai to mark your progress. The way this works is, you send some chakra to the bottoms of your feet to stick to the tree."

"Kakashi-sensei?" asked Naruto, "Since I already know this exercise, can I go work on something else?"

"Sure," said Kakashi, "Just be back at Tazuna's house in time for dinner."

Naruto walked off to the sounds of "Hey! This is easy!" from Sakura and an intensely jealous "Hn" from Sasuke.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

When he was completely out of sight, Naruto's chakra pulsed, and a group of animals appeared out of nothing. Squirrels, chipmunks, field mice, sparrows, finches, and crows scampered, ran and flew in all directions. Several of the transformed shadow clones headed straight for the former Daimyo's mansion, while others began a search pattern that would give Naruto a thorough survey of the island of Wave within hours.

Naruto himself used the Transformation Jutsu to turn into an ordinary middle-aged civilian and started walking through the main town to get a feel for the place. There was no way he was going to do any real training out in the open where someone could see him.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

That evening, Team 7 met in Tazuna's house. Sakura looked completely worn out, having been told she needed to keep practicing until she could walk backwards all the way up and down the tree ten times without stopping. Sasuke looked extremely annoyed to the point that he wanted to smash something with his fist. Kakashi looked amused, though whether that was because of his students' behavior or because of his choice of reading, no one could tell. Naruto looked satisfied.

"Fruitful day, Naruto?" asked Kakashi.

"Yeah," answered Naruto. "Got a lot done."

"Oh? What did you work on?" Kakashi was curious about what stage Naruto's training was at.

"This and that." Naruto deflected.

"Mmm." Apparently Kakashi was even more curious to see what was on the next page of his book.

At this point, Tazuna's grandson Inari interrupted. "Why do you work so hard? It's not like it's gonna be any use."

"What do you mean?" asked Naruto.

"Gato's too strong. You're all going to die anyway, what's the point in trying?"

"And what makes you think we're not stronger than Gato?"

"Gato's got hundreds of men! He'll just have you killed if you get in his way."

"Hmm, I see. Well, Inari, right?" Naruto reached into a pocket and pulled out a small scroll.

Instead of answering the question, Inari just glared. Naruto unsealed something from the scroll. It was a smooth mahogany cane with a fancy gold handle and a large ruby set in the top.

"Inari, do you know what this is?"

"A walking stick? What does that have to do with anything?"

"It's not a walking stick, it's a cane. A pimp cane. More specifically, this is Gato's pimp cane." Naruto handed the cane to the five-year-old boy.

Tazuna and Tsunami's eyes widened. Inari examined the cane.

"You see," explained Naruto, "I stole this cane from Gato while he was holding it, leaning on it in fact. I replaced it with a fake, and he didn't even notice. He still hasn't noticed. And that's not all. The fake I gave him is special: it's a spy cane. It'll let me know everything that Gato says, hears, and does until the cane is lost or broken."

Tazuna, Tsunami, Sasuke and Sakura were gaping by now. Kakashi was probably gaping too, but no one could tell because of his mask.

Inari was stubborn, though. "So? How's that gonna help? It's not like the cane makes you stronger than Gato."

"Ah, but that's the trick. Real ninja don't fight. Real ninja just win. We don't need to be stronger than Gato and all his men to beat him. Now here's the good part. Kakashi sensei, I'd like to propose a plan."

"Go ahead."

"Tonight, when my 'spy cane' tells me that Gato is asleep and his base is quiet for the night, we sneak in and release sleeping gas into the ventilation system. When everyone is good and knocked out, we just walk in and collect all the weapons belonging to his thugs. We steal all of Gato's cash, which he has a lot of, because his illegal activities mostly generate cash. We hand out all the weapons and most of the money to the villagers. We take a couple of money bags and plant them in the house where Zabuza and his friend are staying. When Gato wakes up and discovers he's been robbed, the first thing he'll do is run to the ninja he hired. And Zabuza and his friend will either get caught and have to fight Gato, or they'll wake up first, find the money, figure out what's going on, and abandon Gato. Either way, we win. And I don't think the thugs will be quite so tough when they're facing their own weapons in the hands of the angry villagers."

"And what if Zabuza's friend catches us sneaking into their house?" asked Kakashi.

"I've already got a shadow clone transformed into a bug hiding under Zabuza's bed. Pretty certain I can release a sleeping gas without anyone noticing. They have a few traps, but they should be easy to get around without anyone monitoring them."

"Alright, Naruto, we'll go with your plan. We'll head out an hour after sunset."

"So, Inari, still think it's useless to go against Gato?"

Inari's shook his head. "Can I come?"

Naruto chuckled. "Sorry kid, there's a chance that some of the thugs will be out on patrol or something and won't get caught by the sleeping gas. We're ninja, we can easily handle a couple of thugs, but it's not so easy to fight and protect you at the same time. That reminds me, actually, most of us should Henge into Zabuza, and one of us should Henge into his friend, so if we are seen, we can pin the blame on them. We already know Zabuza likes using clones, so it won't be out of character if three Zabuza's show up."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

The next morning, Gato was sleeping fitfully when one of his underlings rushed into his bedroom shouting, "Boss! Boss! Wake up! We've been robbed!"

The midget gangster/buisnessman woke up feeling rather chilly. He rolled over, wondering where his comfy blanket had gone, rubbed his eyes, and growled, "What is it, Zori?"

Then he blinked. "What the hell! Zori, why are you in your skivvies?"

"We've been robbed, boss! EVERYONE is in their skivvies! Including you! All our weapons are gone! And the storeroom's been broken into, the money's gone!"

That got Gato's attention. "WHAT?!" he roared. He jumped out of bed, absently noting that he was, indeed, wearing only his boxers and an undershirt, instead of the silk pajamas he had put on last night, and his bed-covers were indeed missing. He rushed out of the room faster than you could imagine, only stopping to collect his trusty pimp cane on the way in case he had to beat some of his stupider employees.

"NOOOOOOOOOOO! MY MONEYYYYY! ALL MY PRECIOUS RYO! AND MY BELOVED AMERICAN GIRL DOLL COLLECTION!" Gato fell to his knees and beat his fists on the ground of the empty storeroom.

All of the thugs within earshot sweatdropped. American? Doll collection? Maybe he meant those freaky plastic Barbie dolls that had made their way from outside the Elemental Countries? Let it be noted that there wasn't a single woman among Gato's employees, and none of the men had daughters, so it was unlikely that any of them knew anything about dolls.

"Uh… Boss?"

"What is it, Waraji? And put on a shirt! You're wearing even less than the rest of my minions!" Waraji, a big muscular man with tattoos, _never_ wore a shirt – he didn't even own one. Ironically, he looked less uncomfortable with his current attire than most of the other thugs did.

"Boss, should we call the police?"

Gato looked at Waraji strangely. Zori slapped Waraji on the back of the head. "Idiot! We killed the police, remember?"

"Oh, right."

Another mercenary had something to say. "Boss, some of the patrols said they were knocked out by those ninja you hired. Zabuza and his little friend. Haku, I think."

Gato's face turned red. Steam poured out of his ears. He roared, "I'M GONNA KILL THOSE DAMN THIEVING BASTARDS! FOLLOW ME!" Raising his pimp cane, Gato rushed towards the house Zabuza and Haku had commandeered. On the waterfront. On the other side of town. Barefoot. In his skivvies.

The villagers peeked out their windows to watch a fuming Gato lead his entire collection of half-naked, unarmed thugs through the middle of town at a speed that was sprinting for Gato's short legs and a half-jog for most of his followers. Gato didn't notice the camera flashes, but some of his men did, and cringed.

Haku woke up to the sound of almost a hundred bare feet slapping the ground as Gato and his thugs rushed towards their house. Looking out the window, Haku saw the angry faces and quickly used chakra to pull some water from the nearby ocean and form two ice swords. The androgynous ninja stood in front of the bed where Zabuza lay, still paralyzed, as Gato burst through the door waving his cane.

"YOU!" screamed the midget. "YOU STOLE MY MONEY!"

"You've cracked," stated Zabuza, who was awake but still paralyzed.

"We haven't been in your mansion since last week," said Haku.

"DON'T LIE! YOU WERE SEEN!"

"Uh… Boss?"

"WHAT IS IT, WARAJI?!"

Waraji pointed at a couple of green sacks with ryo signs pasted on them.

"AHA! PROOF! MEN, KILL...urk!"

Haku struck.

In the space of a heartbeat, Gato and the three thugs who had made it through the door were dead. In the next heartbeat, Haku threw one ice sword into the bathroom where it sliced off the sink faucet, sending a spray of water into the air. Two more heartbeats and Haku had finished a set of hand-seals, shooting a barrage of ice senbon, taking down the men who were trying to enter the room and spraying the defenseless mercenaries outside with the knitting-needle sized weapons.

Then the villagers attacked. Headed by Inari and Tsunami, with Team 7 disguised as civilians, a mob armed with all manner of swords, rakes, shovels, and even pots and pans descended on Gato's already cringing army.

One of the thugs saw fit to state, "Hell, man. I ain't stickin' around here no more." He turned and fled for the docks, the rest of Gato's half-naked former employees on his heels, all chased by the angry mob.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Once Gato's remaining men had fled the country on a few of the dead man's ships, Team 7 returned to

Tazuna's house.

Kakashi pulled out his orange book, leaned against a wall, and started reading.

Naruto disappeared upstairs.

Inari shouted, "That was AWESOME! Hey Naruto, whatcha doin'?" and followed Naruto upstairs.

Tsunami smiled, went into the kitchen and started preparing breakfast.

Sasuke said, "Hn," and sat down at the dining room table to wait for breakfast.

Tazuna followed suit, without the "Hn."

Sakura couldn't take it. She shouted, "Why is everyone so CALM! We just, I don't know, destroyed Gato and his entire army like it was NOTHING! And we're just sitting down to eat breakfast like it didn't happen?"

Tazuna chuckled, "Well, it was a really super plan Naruto came up with. And I guess he did some really super sneaking yesterday. He's quite a super ninja, isn't he?"

Sakura took a deep breath and thought for a minute. "I guess. It's just strange, Naruto has always been this stupid idiot. He's the dead last of our class, you know. It's surprising that he was the one to come up with this."

"And," Sakura continued, "he spent all of yesterday _spying_ on Gato and Zabuza. I thought he was _training_. And then there's that Shadow Clone technique, where did he learn that? It definitely wasn't in the Academy! And what's he doing now, hiding from us?"

"Sasuke," she turned to her remaining teammate, "has Naruto always been this mysterious?"

"Hn." Sasuke shrugged, drawing out the grunt in a way that meant, "I dunno".

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Naruto," said Sasuke, "Fight me."

It was the day after the victory over Gato, and Sasuke had finally finished mastering the tree-walking exercise. Naturally, once he mastered it, he proved that he had far more chakra than Sakura, and could walk up and down a tree thirty times without stopping, while Sakura could barely manage ten.

While Team 7 had, in practice, completed the mission to protect Tazuna by removing the threat to his life, they were still contracted to provide bodyguard services until the bridge was finished. So they had to stick around for another two weeks or so. Strangely, a huge bridge like this would only take a total of one and a half months to build. Tazuna had heard tales of a bridge in a far-off place across the ocean called San Francisco, where they had built a bridge – not much longer than the Wave one – that took them an entire four years to complete. He couldn't explain why there was such a huge difference in building speed. It's not like they were using chakra powers to build the Wave bridge. He'd met one sea captain who blamed it on "unions", but Tazuna couldn't imagine what pipe fittings had to do with a bridge, nor why they inspired such disgust in the sea captain.

In any case, Team 7 had to stick around. They took turns standing watch at the bridge while Tazuna was there, and today Kakashi assigned Sakura to guard duty. Which meant Sasuke and Naruto were free for training… or sparring.

"Why do you wanna fight me?" asked Naruto.

Sasuke almost lost his temper. "So we can see who's stronger!"

"Oooooh," said Naruto. "You want to spar. It's very different from a fight."

"Tch. Whatever. You coming?"

"What's in it for me?"

"What?" Sasuke gaped. He thought Naruto would jump at the chance to test his strength.

"I said, what's in it for me? Why would I want to spar with you?"

Sasuke thought a bit. "Practice," he declared. "You can practice getting your butt whooped."

Naruto snorted. "I'm good, thanks."

Kakashi, however, had different ideas. "Naruto, it'll be good for teamwork. If you spar with each other you'll learn about each others' fighting styles, so you can coordinate better in a real fight."

Naruto pouted. "Fine. Sensei, will you judge?"

"Someone has to drag you two back here when you get knocked out."

"Okay!" chirped Naruto, suddenly cheerful. "Same place where you learned tree-walking! See ya there!" He dashed out the door.

Five minutes later Sasuke and Kakashi arrived to find Naruto lying in a hammock slung in the center of the clearing, attached to two trees with rope. Kakashi stopped at the edge of the clearing.

"Naruto," growled Sasuke, stomping towards the hammock, "We're supposed to fight, not sleep!"

FWOOSH! A snare caught Sasuke by the feet and strung him upside-down from a tree branch.

Sasuke screamed. Girlishly. Naruto sat up in the hammock and snapped a picture.

"This is how I fight," said Naruto.

Sasuke flung a kunai at Naruto. It was surprisingly well-aimed, considering the position he threw it from. While Naruto deflected the kunai, Sasuke cut himself down from the snare.

Sasuke threw a handful of shuriken at Naruto. Naruto simply lay down in the hammock and let the throwing stars bounce off the bottom of the hammock. Looks like that hammock was woven with steel or something.

"Aaah, this is the life." Slurp. Where did he get that lemonade from?

Sasuke saw red. He charged Naruto again. The ground fell out from under him. There was a loud squelching sound as he hit the bottom and fell on his back.

"UGH! WHAT IS THIS STUFF!"

Naruto snapped his fingers, and a piece of string lowered from the canopy with a paper sealing tag on the end of it. It stopped above Sasuke's face.

"Boom," said Naruto. "I win."

"Winner: Naruto," declared Kakashi.

"Fine. You win. NOW GET ME OUT OF HERE!"

"Okay!" said Naruto, far too cheerfully.

A pungent liquid burst out of the paper sealing tag. On the up side, it dissolved the goop that had Sasuke trapped, Naruto had another embarrassing photo, and it had a delightful orangey-citrus scent. On the down side, Sasuke was now soaked, the delightful orangey-citrus scent was incredibly overpowering, and the remains of the goop combined with the liquid were rather sticky, so when Sasuke climbed out of the dirt hole he would be covered in brown muck.

"GACK!" spluttered Sasuke. He climbed out of the hole, fuming. "What. The. Hell. Was. That."

"What do you mean?" asked Naruto, seemingly nonplussed.

"I want a REAL fight! Spar! Whatever! Not a stupid trapped obstacle course!"

"I told you, this is how I fight."

"You weren't fighting! You were just lying in that stupid hammock! Get out of that thing and fight me!"

"Wait… you mean like… two people rushing at each other and taking shots at each other with… swords or knives, or... jutsu and… blocking, and… dodging, and… all that crap?"

"YES! Finally the dead-last gets it!"

"Go find a samurai. Remember what I said two days ago to Inari? Real ninja don't fight. Real ninja just win. And I just won."

"Fine, be that way! How about another round!"

"If you don't give up right now, I'll put up poster-sized prints of these photos _all_ over Konoha."

"Grrrr."

"Hey, cheer up! I've got another lemonade."

Stomp. Stomp. Stomp. Sasuke headed in the direction of the shore, hoping to get rid of the filth covering him before anyone else saw him.

"I promise, it's not poisoned! Or pranked!"

Stomp. Stomp. Stomp.

"Kakashi-sensei? Want a lemonade?"

Kakashi approached gingerly, using his Sharingan to look for traps.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Two weeks later, Team 7 finally headed back to Konoha, this time using the tree-climbing skills Sasuke and Sakura had just learned to jump through the trees in a straight line towards their "hidden" village (meaning everybody and their mother knew where it was).

Suddenly, Kakashi called, "Halt! We've got company!"

Zabuza Momochi landed on a tree limb ahead of them. Beside him, Haku Yuki landed on another tree limb, this time not wearing a Hunter-nin mask. Zabuza was carrying an oversized katana, obviously one that formerly belonged to one of Gato's mercenaries.

"Hatake," said Zabuza, "that was a mighty fine trick you pulled getting Gato to attack us. We appreciate the money, but I want my sword back."

"Huh? Your sword?"

"Kakashi-sensei, I'm pretty sure he means that over-sized meat cleaver he used to fight us last time. What was it called, the Kyuubi-butcher?"

Kakashi choked.

"Whatever," continued Naruto. "I'm the one that beat you last time, I kept the sword, and I'm not giving it back. You were on a mission to kill an innocent man, which means you have to accept the risk of losing your life, the life of your apprentice Haku here," Naruto nodded at Haku, "or anything else precious to you. Part of the business."

"It's Kubikiribōchō! And if I say I'll kill you if you don't give it back?"

"Why Zabuza, are you looking for a fight?" Naruto looked waaaay too nonchalant about this.

Zabuza drew his katana.

Kakashi tensed to block Zabuza.

Naruto made a single one-handed seal.

Zabuza froze, shouted a curse word, and toppled bonelessly off the branch he was about to leap from.

"Master Zabuza!" cried Haku, diving to catch said swordmaster.

"Uh, Naruto?" queried Kakashi. "What did you just do?"

"Remember the paralysis and chakra disruption seal I put on him the first time we fought? Yeah, they never actually removed the seal, they just waited for the chakra to wear out. Which means I could easily activate it the same way I did the first time."

While Kakashi snickered and Sakura and Sasuke looked confused, Naruto called, "Haku!"

Haku, who had managed to catch Zabuza, looked up from the forest floor.

"There's a rather large rebellion movement in Kiri headed by a lady called Mei Terumi, seeking to overthrow Yagura and stop the bloodline massacres. I think you and Zabuza would be interested in joining forces, no?"

Haku looked surprised, very surprised. "We'll check it out. Thank you, Naruto." Haku flickered away, carrying Zabuza over one shoulder.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Naruto," Sakura spoke up, "I have a question."

They had just entered Konoha and were on their way to the Hokage Tower to make their report.

"Yes, Sakura?"

"You had one of those Shadow Clones spying on Zabuza and Haku for days, right?"

"Yup, I had one transformed into a bug hiding under Zabuza's bed. Then after Haku killed Gato, the clone I had transformed into Gato's pimp cane was there as well."

"Here's the question: was Haku a boy or a girl?"

"I DON'T KNOW!" shouted Naruto, pulling at his hair. "I didn't want to actually peek on Haku in the bathroom, and Haku didn't change clothes in the bedroom 'cuz Zabuza was there. Haku looks like Haku has a girl's face, but Haku doesn't seem like Haku has any girl parts, but I can't tell for sure because Haku always wore these girly pink fluffy pajamas, and Haku's kimono just covers everything! And Zabuza doesn't talk much, but when he did he never, ever said anything to indicate what Haku's gender was! You might have noticed I never use any pronouns when talking about Haku! It's so frustrating! And I didn't want to just ask 'cuz that'd be rude! If Haku turned out to be a boy it'd be like calling him a girly-boy, and if Haku turned out to be a girl it'd be like saying she doesn't look pretty enough, which is totally not true! And then Haku could be a boy pretending to be a girl, or a girl pretending to be a boy, and whatever answer Haku gives could be a lie anyway."

"Really, you think Haku is pretty?"

" _That's_ what you got out of my rant? Yeah. Isn't it obvious? Sasuke, Haku is relatively pretty, right?"

"Hn." It was a rather ambiguous grunt.

"See, even Sasuke thinks Haku is pretty. And I've never EVER heard Sasuke compliment a girl before."

Sakura was NOT happy at this revelation, for multiple reasons mostly involving her ego. But she hid it well, and said teasingly, "So… you could both be crushing on a boy?"

"AAAAARRRGH!" screamed Naruto.

"Hn. Is that a bad thing?" asked Sasuke, thinking Sakura might stop crushing on him if she thought he was gay. It was the biggest mistake of his life.

"YAOI!" squealed Sakura, loud enough that the birds in the forest on top of the Hokage Mountain took flight in surprise. All the yaoi fan-girls in Konoha, and the one yaoi fan-boy, heard the battle-cry, and came running to get the latest, juiciest rumor.

Naruto, feeling a disturbance in the Force, said, "Sensei-I'll-see-you-in-the-Tower," and vanished so quickly that Kakashi would have sworn he used the Hiraishin if that were not completely impossible.

The fan-girls came from all directions, hemming in Kakashi and Sasuke. "Details, Sakura, details!"

Sakura pointed at Sasuke, but her voice was drowned out in the crowd. "It's forbidden love!" shouted one. "But with who?" asked another. Somehow, one preteen girl put two and two together to get six, and shouted, "Sasuke and Kakashi! Forbidden luuurrrve! SQUEEEE!"

Kakashi decided, then and there, to request another long C-ranked mission outside of the village.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Hi Gramps!" said Naruto, barreling into the Hokage's office.

"Naruto! You're back!" Hiruzen was happy to see his surrogate grandson hadn't been negatively affected by the mission.

"Yup, mission success! Sensei and the team will probably be late though. They got attacked by yaoi fan-girls." Hiruzen, Naruto, and the ANBU hiding in the room shuddered. Fan-girls were scary. Yaoi fan-girls were even scarier.

"Well, how did it go?" asked Hiruzen.

"I got a new toy! Wanna see it?"

"Sure, let's see this new toy."

Naruto pulled out a giant cleaver-blade and waved it around. "I stole it from a guy called Zabuza! I think he called it 'Kyuubi-butcher' or something, which is strange because I don't think the Yondaime used it when he killed the Kyuubi, but anyway, this sword is really cool!"

Hiruzen choked. "I think it's Kubikiribōchō, Naruto. You say you ran into Zabuza Momochi on your mission?"

"Yeah! He was all like, 'Grrr!' and Kakashi-sensei was like, 'GRRR!', and then Zabuza made some clones, and then I made some clones! And then one of my clones used Kawarimi with his sword and kicked him in the ass! And that's how I got the sword."

"That's… a very unusual use of Kawarimi," said Hiruzen, shocked. Kawarimi was a defensive jutsu! It was meant for escaping attacks, nobody used it as an attack. And did he say his clone performed the Kawarimi? Did Kakashi teach him the Shadow Clone? It did make sense after all, Naruto had plenty of chakra thanks to his status as a Jinchūriki.

"Uh-huh!" said Naruto, brushing it off. "And then we pranked Gato and blamed it on Zabuza and Haku and Gato attacked Haku and that didn't go so well for Gato and then we chased all Gato's men out of town in their skivvies and I got pictures! Wanna see?"

 _So Sasuke activated the Sharingan_ , mused Hiruzen. "That sounds like a rather wild tale, Naruto. May I see these pictures?"

Naruto pulled out a storage scroll from one of his pockets and unsealed a small stack of photos, which he handed to the Hokage.

The first photo was of an infuriated Gato, leading his men through the middle of town in their undershirts and underwear, brandishing his fancy cane.

The next photo was of Gato's army crowded around Zabuza and Haku's small house, with ice needles flying out the doorway.

The third photo was of the villagers waving swords and pickaxes and various other implements chasing the thugs in their underwear.

Finally, there were several photos of the holds of Gato's ships, with "Gato Shipping" labeled on the boxes. Inside were tons of illegal drugs. Other photos showed shackles and chains, clearly indicating that Gato was involved in human trafficking at some point.

"I figured you could send those photos to anyone who wants to know why Gato's not around anymore."

"I see. That's quite an achievement, Naruto. And who came up with this plan?"

"I did, of course! I'm the Prank King!" Naruto struck a pose.

That was when Kakashi and Sasuke limped into the room.

Kakashi looked like a mess. His mask was ripped halfway down one side, his forehead protector was on backwards, his vest was unzipped, he was altogether rather scuffed up, and his normal gravity-defying hair was braided into cornrows.

Sasuke looked traumatized. His clothes were askew, ones sandal was missing, and his normal duck-butt hairstyle was lopsided and drooping. He had lipstick on his cheek, and a look of absolute horror on his face.

"Naaaruuutooo," said Kakashi, his voice hoarse. "You abaaaandoned ussss..."

Naruto just snickered and snapped a photo.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

That evening, a knock came on the door of the house where Mei Terumi was staying with some of her advisors.

"I'll get it, Lady Mei," said Chojiro.

"Whirlwind Postal delivery for Mei Terumi," said a man in a delivery uniform. He had one of those totally forgettable faces.

"Um… Lady Mei?"

"Yes, that's me," said Mei from behind Chojiro.

"Where do you want me to unseal this? It's about eight feet long," asked the delivery man.

"Right here in the entryway should be fine," said Mei, pulling Chojiro out of the way. Chojiro blushed when she put her hand on his shoulder.

The delivery man unsealed a huge cleaver blade on the floor.

"Is that… Kubikiribōchō?" asked Mei.

"Have a nice day, miss!" said the delivery man blandly, as if it were nothing out of the ordinary. As he turned and left, they read the message on the back of his delivery uniform jacket:

WHIRLWIND POSTAL

We Deliver Anywhere, to Anybody,

Speedy, Safe and Confidential!

"It's the real thing," announced Ao, coming into the room and inspecting the sword with the Byakugan under his eye-patch. "There's an envelope tied to the handle, looks safe."

"Let's see what it says." She opened the envelope with a kunai and pulled out a note.

 _Dear Miss Terumi,_

 _I expect that Zabuza Momochi and his apprentice, Haku Yuki, will join up with your army within a month or so. If he does not, I'm sure you can find someone else worthy of wielding this sword. If he does, tell him to remember Secret Ninja Rule Number Zero._

 _\- A Friend_

"What's Secret Ninja Rule Number Zero?" asked Chojiro.

Ao growled, "It's an old saying they used to have in Kiri, back in the days before the Second Ninja War. It goes:

"Don't fuck with the Uzumaki."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

How to be a Ninja  
 _by Minato Namikaze_

Chapter 4: Real Ninja Don't Fight: Real Ninja Just Win

Ninja fight in the shadows. Samurai fight in the daylight. The ideal ninja is one who achieves all his objectives in the easiest way possible, and usually, that means without fighting.

Ninja who fight only with chakra and physical strength is only using a small part of their potential. There are lots of forms of power. Use them all to become the most successful ninja you can be.

Of course, there will be situations where you'll be confronted with someone who you weren't able to take out before they attack you. Ambushes, straight-up wars, surprises, stuff like that. In this case, it's important that you don't engage in a fair fight. Find a way to cheat! Lay traps, use last-minute blackmail, bluff your way out, fight dirty. And as a last resort, use an incredibly overpowered S-ranked jutsu like Hiraishin to lay the beat-down without giving them a chance to blink! (See Chapter 9 for details on the Hiraishin.)

(Author's Note: The following sections are not written out because their contents are obvious and, therefore, boring.)

 **Section (a): Money is Power Too**

 **Section (b): The Power of Persuasion**

 **Section (c): Blackmail**

 **Section (d): Assassination**

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Author's Note: Thanks for all the reviews! I read every single one! I promise I will go back and make edits and corrections at some point. Down-side of posting chapters as I write is that I may not end up following my original intentions for the story… for example, this turned out to be far more parody than adventure (thanks to several reviewers for pointing this out) and I will be re-categorizing the story as Humor/Parody. There will still be some serious scenes and chapters though. And for some reason, even though I really dislike Sasuke and Sakura I couldn't find it in my heart to really bash them, so I'm removing that warning. If I make any important alterations to the earlier part of the story I will certainly point them out with an Author's Note at the top of the next chapter.


	5. Chapter 5: A Little Bit of Everything

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any of the characters in this story.

Chapter 5: A Little Bit of Everything

Mizuki, Chūnin instructor of Konoha's Shinobi Academy, hid in the attic of an elderly merchant's house as he scoped out the Hokage Tower.

 _Perfect,_ he thought as he watched the three Genin of Team 7 leave after their debriefing and go their separate ways. _Now that the demon brat is back in town, I can move forward with my plans._

He vanished into the shadows as he followed Naruto back to his apartment.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Sasuke went back to the extensive Uchiha clan training grounds and started practicing his fire jutsu and shurikenjutsu. He couldn't be bothered to think about anyone other than himself.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Sakura, _Sakura_!" Ino shout-whispered, grabbing Sakura's arm as Sakura, Sasuke and Naruto left the Hokage tower. Ino shot Sasuke a half-shifty, half-flirty look that should have been impossible. "Sakura, we need to talk!"

Sakura complied, and the two of them went off to a restaurant to talk and eat. Which was rare, nowadays, for the somewhat-former friends/rivals.

"So," demanded Ino, "Is it true?"

"Is what true?" Sakura asked, pretending she didn't know.

"Is Sasuke… you know?"

Sakura looked conflicted.

"Wait a minute… Sakura?"

The pinkette looked guilty.

"… YOU started the rumor that Sasuke is gay?"

Sakura broke. She giggled, "And having hot hot yaoi makeout sessions with Kakashi-sensei? I didn't come up with the Kakashi pairing, but the gay part..."

"You know I'm not into that stuff," snapped Ino. She wasn't a yaoi fan-girl, just a Sasuke fan-girl. She had heard the rumor second-hand. "Why?"

"Well… it's a long story."

"Spill," commanded Ino.

"You see, we were on our first C-rank mission, and there was this enemy nin…" Sakura told Ino all about Haku and Haku's infuriating androgyny. "And then Sasuke said, 'Would that be so bad?' So it was kind of, he didn't really say he liked boys, but he kind of hinted it. And I got thinking, and it's yaoi, and just… you know."

"So you don't actually know? Darn, I really hope he's not gay."

Sakura sighed. "Yeah, I guess." Then she brightened, "Sasuke didn't seem to like it when that yaoi fan-boy kissed him. He was all like, ugh." and she made an exaggerated grimace to show Sasuke's reaction.

"So… he's not? Thank Kami. Not that I'm against gay people, but you know, it's Sasuke dear…" and Ino sighed.

Sakura frowned. "Yeah… it's just, I guess I got jealous, and Sasuke and Naruto were talking about Haku _like that_ , and I just had to get them back."

Ino and Sakura spent a few minutes just eating their low-calorie meals before Sakura came up with another topic.

"Ino," she started, "has Naruto always been so… _mysterious_?" She wiggled her fingers to emphasize the last word.

" _Mysterious_?" echoed Ino. "You mean Sasuke, he's the _mysterious_ type."

"No, I mean Naruto. Did you see what he was _wearing_ earlier?"

Ino considered. "Wait, that hunky boy next to Sasuke was NARUTO?"

"Hunky?" Sakura looked like the cat that caught the canary. "Naruto, hunky? Does this mean you're giving up on Sasuke?"

"Cut it out, you know what I mean. He was wearing… not orange."

"Yeah! Exactly. He was wearing… not orange. And he doesn't tell us anything about himself, and when we fought Zabuza he knew a clone jutsu that we weren't taught in the Academy, and even though Zabuza couldn't have been very strong Naruto knocked him out so quickly! And Naruto was so serious for the first half of the mission, I mean, he's still goofy and stupid but it's like he can turn it off sometimes! And when Kakashi-sensei was teaching us tree-climbing, Naruto already knew it but Sasuke didn't! I can't believe Naruto knew something Sasuke didn't."

"That's impossible, Sasuke knows everything. Wait, tree-climbing? But everyone knows how to climb trees, Forehead."

"...Your sensei doesn't teach you anything either, does he?"

Ino shook her head and huffed.

"It's a chakra control exercise," explained Sakura. "You walk up a tree on just your feet, using your chakra to stick to the tree. And I meant what I said – after Kakashi-sensei showed us the tree-climbing, Naruto freaking moonwalked up the tree like some horribly flashy 80's pop star! I tried that after I learned regular tree-walking, it's a LOT more difficult to do it moonwalking! You have to concentrate chakra into the toe of the foot that's not moving while completely cutting off the chakra to the foot that's sliding backwards, know what I mean?"

Ino looked like she was barely managing to follow along, but nodded anyway.

"And then," continued Sakura, "NARUTO was the one who came up with the plan to get rid of Gato. That little boy Inari was all gloomy and 'you're all gonna die, Gato's gonna kill you', but Naruto tells everyone that he spent the entire day spying on Gato and Zabuza and he says, 'Real ninja don't fight, real ninja just win,' and then Naruto tells Kakashi-sensei this whole plan that actually sounded clever! At first I thought he was just trying to upstage Sasuke, but Kakashi-sensei went with it and it actually worked!"

"So what are you saying, that Naruto's been hiding stuff from us?"

"Yes! Naruto's been hiding stuff from EVERYONE! It's like I don't even know who he is anymore."

Ino chewed her food for a minute. "You know what this means, right?"

"Umm…?"

"WE MUST INVESTIGATE!" declared Ino, dramatically stabbing her salad fork in the air. "We'll get down to the bottom of this! We'll stalk his friends, we'll shadow him from the shadows, we'll figure out what he reads (if he reads anything at all), we'll find out who he likes and who likes him, we'll learn where he eats and what he eats, if he's mysterious, we'll de-mystify him!" Ino got that crazed Yamanaka rumor-hunting look on her face, struck a pose, and shouted, "INFORMATION WANTS TO BE FREE!"

Sakura shook her head. Then she smiled, jumped up, and grabbed Ino in a hug. "It's good to have you back, Ino."

Ino nodded, and hugged Sakura back. "It's good have you back too, Sakura."

Then Ino broke the hug and said, "Sasuke's still mine though."

"No way, Ino-pig! Sasuke's all mine!"

Just then, an orange blur ran past the front of the restaurant.

"RAMEN! I'VE MISSED YOU, DATTEBAYO!"

Ino and Sakura looked at each other and laughed.

"Boys," they said in unison.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Hiruzen Sarutobi had long been one of the sharpest minds in the village, and this fact did not dull in his old age. After dismissing the three Genin of Team 7, he asked their Jōnin sensei to stay.

Kakashi straightened up, his clothing falling into place and the rip in his mask suddenly vanishing. The cornrows stayed, though.

"So, Kakashi… what's this I hear about you letting Naruto fight an A-ranked missing nin by himself?"

Kakashi was sweating. "It wasn't… I didn't. I told the team to protect the client. I challenged Zabuza, we both released our killing intent, you know how it goes. Then one of the kids, I'm not sure if it was Naruto or Sasuke, used a powerful wind jutsu to clear Zabuza's mist. And Naruto just… it reminded me of watching Minato-sensei fight, you blink and it's over! Except Naruto _didn't even move_."

"From Naruto's description of the fight," said Hiruzen, "he used Shadow Clones. He said he had one of them Kawarimi with Zabuza's sword?"

"Yes, a very creative use of Kawarimi. He created three shadow clones and two of them destroyed Zabuza's water clones. I didn't even see how they did it. The third used the Kawarimi with Zabuza's sword and slapped a paralysis and chakra disruption tag on the back of Zabuza's neck, Naruto activated it, and that was it."

"Hmm… how long did it take him to learn the Shadow Clone Jutsu? I assume you taught him?"

Kakashi looked confused. "No, I didn't teach him. I thought you had taught him. Maybe he watched one of the other Jōnin perform the technique?"

Apparently the "ignore me" Genjutsu on that book was _very_ good.

"Possibly," said Hiruzen. "There are a number of Jōnin who know the Shadow Clone jutsu. And he could have gotten the sealing tag at one of the more specialized stores. Has he exhibited any other unusual behavior?"

"Well… he seems to know a lot about what's going on in Kiri. He told Zabuza's apprentice the rebel leader's name. Mei Terumi?"

Once again, Hiruzen was surprised. "That's not public knowledge. Jiraya's spies reported her name years ago, but we never told anyone, not even the Shinobi Council. And as far as I know, Jiraya hasn't been in contact with Naruto."

"I suppose he could have overheard it from that Whirlwind employee he mentioned at the start of the mission."

"Hmm… Whirlwind Postal. New company, showed up around a year and a half ago. They have an office in mid-town. They specialize in high-speed long-distance deliveries of letters and small packages. 'We deliver anywhere, to anybody, speedy, safe and confidential', that's their motto."

"Doesn't that cut into our ninja missions escorting scrolls and the like?" asked Kakashi.

"I thought the same, but there's nothing I could do about it. They're a civilian business and not a direct threat to our security. And it turns out the business from C-ranked escort missions has actually doubled in terms of profits since Whirlwind started up. We lost a lot of scroll delivery missions, but we actually gained a large number of personal escort missions, which as you know, pay more than scroll deliveries. It seems that better long-distance communication causes people to travel more."

"Hmm, interesting. Well I suppose if they really deliver to anywhere in the Elemental Countries, they would have to know the general state of places like Kiri. Is Terumi's name general knowledge in Kiri?"

"Yes, it is," said Hiruzen. "The Mizukage posted a rather large bounty on her."

"I suppose that explains Naruto's knowledge. Have you considered sending someone undercover as an employee of Whirlwind? It sounds like it would be useful to learn what information they have on other countries, even if only to learn how much they know."

"That's a good idea, thanks for the suggestion. Now, back to Naruto. How strong is he? He managed to take out a Jōnin level missing-nin using a single high-level Ninjutsu and a couple of tricks. How are his other skills coming along? Taijutsu? Shuriken and kunai throwing? Stealth? Chakra control? Any progress on Genjutsu?"

"Uh..." Kakashi rubbed the back of his head in embarrassment, "His chakra control seems to be good. He already knew the tree-climbing exercise when I taught it to the others."

"Hmm… where did he learn that?"

"He said he read it in a book."

Hiruzen raised an eyebrow again. "Naruto? Read a book?"

"That's what he said."

"Okay, what about Taijutsu and the other skills?"

"… I don't know."

"Kakashi..."

"I've been focusing on their teamwork!"

* * *

– CS –

* * *

 _I've been acting too serious_ , thought Naruto as he dashed toward Ichiraku's, now wearing his orange jumpsuit again. _Kakashi is getting suspicious about my skills, and I certainly don't want to trust him with my secrets. He hasn't even TRIED to teach us a single thing other than tree-climbing. EVERY ninja knows tree-climbing, I've seen them using it since I first learned to spot the ninja dashing around Konoha on the rooftops. I mean, he's not the only Jōnin-sensei to slack off on training his students, but he takes it to an extreme. Not exactly behavior conducive to team loyalty._

 _It's a good thing I managed to get to the Hokage and give Gramps a toned-down description of the mission and the confrontation with Zabuza. He might have gotten more curious if he only got Kakashi's shorthand report. I might like Grandpa Hokage, but there's no way I'm telling him all my secrets. He hasn't even admitted that he knew my parents, and he hasn't even_ hinted _at the Kyuubi. For the Hokage, Konoha comes first, and most of Konoha REALLY doesn't like me._

 _Of course, my tail is certainly not good enough to be an ANBU ordered by Gramps to follow me. Whoever it is kind of sucks at stealth. I wonder who it is? That chakra signature feels familiar, low Chūnin level… good thing I'm already playing the "village idiot" act._

Plastering a bright smile on his face, Naruto bounced toward his favorite ramen stand, shouting, "RAMEN! I'VE MISSED YOU, DATTEBAYO!"

* * *

– CS –

* * *

 _Ugh,_ though Mizuki, _I don't know how some people don't see it. The fact that the brat can eat that much ramen at once is proof that he's not human. Well, we'll see who's laughing at the end of today. Now let's see where you're going next, demon. I need you to be in town, but I can't pull off my plan while you're in public._

Mizuki dashed from one shadow to another as he followed Naruto to wherever he was going.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

After eating twenty bowls of ramen, Naruto went to his run-down apartment in the bad part of town, picked up a comic book, lounged on his ratty couch, and started reading it. Or rather, his shadow clone did.

Deep underground, Naruto walked into his training hall to start his physical training, when he noticed a couple of presences other than the hundreds of shadow clones practicing chakra control and Ninjutsu.

"Shino! Shikamaru! It's been weeks since you've been down here! How's it been going?"

Shikamaru stopped bending his shadow and yawned. "Troublesome. Heard you got back from your first C-rank. We're still on D-ranks."

Shino stated, "We thought once we got on Genin teams our Jōnin-sensei's would start training us more seriously than we did in the academy. Logical, right? But it seems that's not the case. Shikamaru's sensei is lazy enough to be a Nara, and Kurenai-sensei just has us sparring with each other a couple times a day."

"Yeah," agreed Naruto. "Kakashi-sensei taught Sasuke and Sakura the tree-climbing exercise. And that was it. He never did any other training or teaching. But there ARE Jōnin sensei's who do train their students. You've seen Guy Might, right?"

Both of Naruto's friends shivered. "I don't think I've ever seen anyone more troublesome," said Shikamaru.

"Have to agree with you there," said Naruto. "But the point is, he trains his Genin all the time. They spend more time training than on missions."

"I suppose we'll have to just do our own training, like we always have," concluded Shino.

"Yeah," agreed Naruto. He thought back to the day Shino and Shikamaru had become his friends...

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Naruto had just turned nine. It was mid-October, one month after he had discovered the Yondaime's book stashed in the library. He had done the math and decided that Minato Namikaze had to have been his father. He hadn't told anybody, but he had started training in secret.

Over the last month, Naruto's progress was simultaneously frustrating and astounding. Frustrating, because, as his father suggested, Naruto wanted to build an underground training ground, but he didn't know any earth jutsu for digging. There weren't any earth jutsu listed in the book, and there weren't any elemental jutsu at all in the Academy library (elemental transformations were considered a Chūnin-level skill). On the other hand, objectively, Naruto's progress was amazing because he had gone through the chakra control exercises from leaf sticking to tree walking to water walking in the space of one month, and he had learned two of the three Academy Ninjutsu, Henge and Kawarimi.

Currently, Naruto was under a very generic-looking Henge, running sprints on top of a pond from one end to another, with several leaves sticking to his forehead and arms. He was trying to increase his control to the level where he could perform the Academy Bunshin, an illusionary clone which required a very small amount of chakra. Beads of sweat ran down his neck as he concentrated on outputting the right amount of chakra to each of the leaves at the same time as outputting a varying amount from his feet in order to stay atop the water.

That was when two boys from Naruto's Academy class walked up to the pond.

"Hey Naruto," said Shikamaru Nara, a skinny boy with a pineapple-style ponytail, waving his hand at the boy running on the water.

Naruto lost his concentration and fell in the water, producing a big splash. Spluttering, he swam to the edge of the pond and climbed out.

"Hi. Who are you two?" asked Naruto, still under the Henge.

"We know it's you, Naruto," said Shino Aburame, a quiet short-haired brunette wearing a high-collared jacket and sunglasses in the style of his clan. "Why? Because I tracked you with one of my kikaichu (the Aburame clan's parasitic ninja beetles)."

"Uh, okay, you got me, it's me." Naruto dropped the Henge.

"So… question," drawled Shikamaru. "What is the class idiot doing practicing high-level chakra control exercises, and mastering Ninjutsu we won't learn in the Academy until next year?"

Naruto sighed. "Can you guys keep a secret?"

Both of them nodded.

"Okay, basically I'm hiding my skills so that people won't know what to expect from me when I become a ninja. My goal is to become a real ninja, someone who works in stealth and in secret, who uses deception as his greatest weapon. That's why I'm acting stupid and getting the lowest scores. Well, that and sometimes I'm just too tired after training and I fall asleep in class. Can you keep this a secret?"

"Troublesome. Yes," said Shikamaru.

"That makes sense. Of course I can keep it a secret," said Shino.

"Good. So, question," said Naruto. "What is the smartest guy in class doing getting the second-lowest grades?"

Shikamaru groaned. "Troublesome. Class grades don't mean anything in the real world. Why make the effort?"

"Wanna train together?"

* * *

– CS –

* * *

It turned out that Shino and Shikamaru weren't interested in doing anywhere near the same amount of training as Naruto. It helped that both of them were extremely non-competitive. Still, they trained with Naruto a couple of times a week. Naruto was rather annoyed to find that both of them learned the chakra control exercises faster than he did, though neither had anywhere near as much stamina as he did.

"We need a secret underground base where we can train in secret," said Naruto a month later, having finally mastered the Bunshin and wanting to move on to the more interesting things his father came up with.

"Isn't that kind of overkill?" asked Shikamaru.

"Huh? Overkill? What's that?" asked Naruto, quite seriously.

"Overkill:" defined Shikamaru, "spending too much effort on something that isn't worth it."

"Oh. Then no, it's not overkill. I wanna try some training methods that I _really_ don't want anyone seeing. The problem is, we need some earth-style jutsu in order to make an underground training room."

"I'll check my family's library to see if we have any earth-style scrolls," said Shino.

"Likewise," sighed Shikamaru.

"I gotta start pranking higher-level ninja," said Naruto. "Establish a cover before I start sneaking into places like the Chūnin-only library, just in case I get caught."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

One day, in a hollowed-out training hall deep beneath Konoha, two ROOT drones wearing white animal masks were sparring. Suddenly, pebbles started falling from the sandstone ceiling, and the two of them jumped back, falling into a defensive stance.

The ceiling cracked open and a blonde nine-year-old boy fell on his butt.

He blinked, and looked around.

"Hi!" he said cheerily. "I was digging!"

He smiled a broad smile at them, stood up and dusted off his pants, and made a few hand signs.

"See ya later, underground-creature-people!" he chirped, and dove into the ground. The holes in the ceiling and floor closed up, leaving no trace that anything had ever happened.

The two ROOT drones blinked and looked at each other.

"Did _that_ just happen?" asked one in a tone of voice that went against ROOT regulations.

"I think so," said the other. "He was… funny."

Then the anti-emotion seals that all ROOT ninja had tattooed on their skulls kicked in, and both of them forgot it ever happened.

 _Note to self,_ thought Naruto as he dug horizontally after going down several meters. _Figure out how to use Fuinjutsu to protect my base from random strangers using the Earth Release: Hiding Like a Mole Jutsu._

* * *

– CS –

* * *

And that was how it started.

"So," said Naruto, "now that we're all around 13 years old, we can start using light weights and resistance seals without having to worry about stunting our growth."

"I'll take resistance seals," said Shikamaru. "Like your dad wrote, speed is everything in a fight, and the seals are better for speed training."

Oh yeah, Naruto had shared most of the contents of his father's book with his two friends. They couldn't read it, thanks to the powerful Genjutsu seal, and some things were private, but Naruto could certainly copy sections of the book by hand.

"I'm afraid I'll have to stick with weights," said Shino. "My kikaichu will interfere with the resistance seals."

"Okay," said Naruto. "I'll be using seals as well. You guys up for a light Taijutsu spar to get used to them?"

"Taijutsu only. No chakra enhancement!" declared Shikamaru.

Pure Taijutsu was Naruto's weakest area. At a young age, it would have been unwise to attempt the heavy strength training necessary to match top Taijutsu and weapons users based on physical strength. Without enhancing his body with chakra, he was a fair match for his two best friends in a two-on-one Taijutsu match. He had, after all, done far more practice than they.

Of course, when Naruto compensated using large amounts of well-controlled chakra to enhance his body, it was no contest. And when he eventually multiplied his pure physical strength and speed through the new resistance seal training, there was no telling how far he could go.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Naruto's clone, still lounging on his couch reading his comic book, felt his tail disappear. _Hmm, wonder what he's up to? Well, he didn't find out anything about me._

Then Naruto-clone felt a couple of familiar chakra signatures approaching. _Sakura and Ino. What are THEY doing in this part of town?_ _Hmm, they're just outside my window, I think they're spying on me._

Naruto-clone hid his devilish smirk behind his comic book.

He discreetly took a deep breath, shifted his butt, and blew all that air out through his lips in a raspberry to simulate an enormous fart.

Then he grunted, "Aaaaaah… that's better."

Sakura and Ino gagged.

"Phew," said Naruto-clone, waving his comic book in front of his nose. "Guess I need to air out this place." He walked over to the window as if to open it. Before he was halfway there, his enhanced hearing heard the sound of Ino and Sakura fleeing.

When he reached the window, he looked out, and saw something that would have made his blood freeze in his veins, if he had any.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Mizuki snuck into the Hokage tower, using a Henge to impersonate Naruto. He had figured out all the traps and security around his goal months ago, and then his plans had been ruined when that demon brat managed to pass the exam! It had taken him months to come up with an alternate plan.

No one saw him as he dodged between guards and painstakingly disabled or bypassed each trap before finally reaching the treasure. Oh, Orochimaru was going to be so pleased.

As Mizuki picked up the Forbidden Scroll of Seals and slung it on his back using a strap, he failed to notice something glowing on the shelf after he picked it up.

"Naruto! What are you doing?" Mizuki jumped back in surprise when the Hokage himself stepped in front of him.

 _Oh, right, I'm still wearing the face of the demon brat._ "I, uh..."

"Hey! Who are you!" shouted a 9-year-old boy, running up. "Are you trying to steal that scroll? I'll stop you!"

"No, Konohamaru! Get back! That isn't Naruto!"

It was too late. Konohamaru pulled out a wooden kunai and charged at Mizuki, who planted a fist in the little boy's gut, whipped out a real kunai, and held it to Konohamaru's neck.

"Let me go, or your grandson dies," threatened Mizuki.

With a look of anger on his face, the Hokage backed off. Mizuki dashed out the window, still holding Konohamaru with the kunai at his neck. He raced through the streets of Konoha, still wearing Naruto's face.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Naruto groaned. "That was brutal."

Shino groaned. His insects buzzed quietly.

Shikamaru yawned. "Naruto… what do you think… about getting some… clouds down here?"

All three of them were lying on their backs after their first training spar with weights/seals.

Shino groaned again. "Shika," said Shino, "Don't get him started on Fuinjutsu."

It was too late.

"Well..." started Naruto, "I suppose I could design a physical-light-reflecting Genjutsu seal that makes the roof blue like the sky and puts clouds up there… but then there's a problem with distance perception, the clouds will look too close… a mind-affecting Genjutsu to fix that would be annoying for anyone who can sense foreign chakra in their system… hmm… you know what would be ideal is if I could make the seal track the locations of everyone in the room and angle the photons at their eyes in just the right angles to make the clouds appear far away, but that would be like… more complex than the Eight Trigrams seal… 'course we don't have to worry about ridiculously powerful chakra levels here, so it's not nearly as dangerous as the Kyuubi's seal…"

"Naruto," interrupted Shino, "remind me again why you're our year's dead last?"

"… and then I'd have to figure out how to make random-shaped clouds, which is gonna be a rather interesting algorithm… or maybe I could just copy the look of the sky outside, which would require a camera somewhere linked to the sky Genjutsu… actually several cameras so we can get all angles of the sky… and probably a modified security seal to keep birds and bugs from landing on the cameras… but then what about the other weather, we don't want it to look like it's raining down here without actually getting wet… probably need to store recordings of nice, partially cloudy days… need a seal to recognize optimal weather patterns, probably have to use one of my new deep neural network seals for that… good thing I came up with that three-dimensional seal technique or I would literally have square miles of seals for every neural net..."

Shikamaru yawned loudly and pointedly.

"Right!" said Naruto jumping up energetically. "I'll get some shadow clones on it." He produced five shadow clones who immediately dashed off through a tunnel to another part of their underground complex.

Shino and Shikamaru decided to take a nap.

That was when Naruto received a memory from the shadow clone in his apartment.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

 _I'll just duck into the alleyway here next to the demon brat's apartment, seal my treasure into a storage scroll, drop my Henge, knock out the Hokage's grandson, and leave. Everyone will think it was the demon brat that stole the scroll. Even the Hokage himself will be hard-pressed to say otherwise, even if he felt my chakra signature._

This was Mizuki's plan. Unfortunately for him, he didn't count on one thing.

"HEY!" shouted Naruto, landing in the street in front of him. "I DON'T KNOW WHO YOU ARE, BUT YOU'RE NOT ME!"

"And what are you gonna do about it? You're just a stupid Genin who shouldn't have even passed the Academy final. And in case you haven't noticed, I've got the Hokage's grandson here."

He held up Konohamaru, who looked just about scared out of his pants.

Naruto considered for a moment, extending his senses. Suddenly he realized who he was talking to.

"Interesting predicament. There's just one problem… Mizuki."

Mizuki gaped. "How did you…? Fine, you figured me out, but it's not gonna help you." He dropped the Henge and held Konohamaru tighter.

"You don't seem to understand your situation," said Naruto. "You see, that's not the Hokage's grandson."

The boy under Mizuki's arm was engulfed in white smoke. When it cleared, what Mizuki was holding was a life-sized, spiky-brown-haired, extremely creepy wooden puppet. The puppet's head creaked and jerked as it turned one-hundred-eighty degrees on its neck and stared into Mizuki's eyes with its painted face.

"Mizuki! Mizuki!" said the puppet in a tinny girl's voice, as if coming from a speaker.

"GAAAAAH!" shouted Mizuki, dropping the puppet and kicking it into the side of a building. The puppet vanished in another puff of smoke.

Naruto snickered. "And one more thing! Your stealth is terrible! You're even worse at stalking people than Hinata is!"

An "Eeep!" came out of an alleyway somewhere down the road.

"I'll kill you, Kyuubi brat!" shouted Mizuki. He pulled out another kunai and rushed Naruto.

"Hey Gramps!" called Naruto. "Any time now!"

The Hokage came down on Mizuki like a load of bricks. Two and a half seconds later, the traitor was a moaning heap of broken bones, and Hiruzen was holding the Scroll of Seals in one hand and his bo-staff in the other.

"Grandpa!" shouted Konohamaru, running out of Naruto's apartment building into his grandfather's arms.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Whoah," said Ino.

"See what I mean?!" whispered Sakura. " _Mysterious_!"

Both of them had turned around at Naruto's shout and had see the entire scene with Mizuki. As had dozens of other villagers.

"He just rescued that kid! And where did he get that creepy, creepy puppet-thing?!" exclaimed Ino.

"And was that _Mizuki-sensei_?" asked Sakura.

Ino nodded. "It was. And he calls the Hokage 'Gramps'! What does that mean?"

"He seems to be really close to the Hokage for some reason," explained Sakura, "It's not the first time I've seen Naruto call Lord Hokage 'Gramps' or 'Old Man'. At first I thought he was being disrespectful, but the Hokage just smiled at Naruto. But I don't know why!"

"Mysterious-er and mysterious-er!" said Ino. "You know what this means, right?"

"Mm-hm!" nodded Sakura. "More investigation!"

* * *

– CS –

* * *

While Ino and Sakura were acting like... well... twelve-year-olds, Hiruzen led Konohamaru and Naruto back to the Hokage tower, where he replaced the Scroll of Seals and reactivated security, then led them back to his office.

"Naruto, I owe you my thanks," said Hiruzen. "Konohamaru tells me you got him out of danger even before you jumped in front of Mizuki."

"Uhh… yeah, no problem!" Naruto rubbed the back of his neck in embarrassment.

"I take it you used the same method as you used on Zabuza? A shadow clone with a Kawarimi?"

Naruto nodded.

"Interesting touch with the Henge."

"Yeah!" said Konohamaru from where he sat in his grandfather's lap. "That puppet was _creeeepy_!"

"I do wonder why you didn't take on Mizuki yourself… the way you did with Zabuza."

"Oh..." Naruto's face fell. "I just didn't want all those people who were watching to see how dangerous the 'Kyuubi-brat' could be."

"I was gonna ask you about that!" said Konohamaru with all the sensitivity of an eight-year-old. "Why did Mizuki call you 'Kyuubi-brat'?"

"Naruto..."

"It's okay Gramps, I figured it out years ago," said Naruto, seriously. "The villagers have been calling me 'Kyuubi-brat' and 'demon-spawn' ever since I can remember. And you always avoided the question whenever I asked you who my parents were."

Hiruzen frowned, wondering if Naruto had figured out who his parents were.

"Konohamaru," continued Naruto, "did anyone ever tell you about the attack thirteen years ago, when the great Nine-Tailed Demon Fox, Kyuubi no Kitsune, attacked Konoha?"

"Uh-huh," nodded the little boy.

"Everyone knows that the Yondaime Hokage defeated the Kyuubi. And that's true, but it's not the whole truth."

"Uh-huh," said Konohamaru. "Get to the point already!"

"You see," explained Naruto, "the Kyuubi was my daddy."

…

…

Hiruzen choked.

Two ANBU lost concentration, fell from the ceiling, and hit the floor headfirst.

Konohamaru said, "Whoah. _Really_?"

"Mmm-hmm! Really!" Naruto nodded.

"I see!" said Konohamaru, having solved a great mystery. "That explains the whiskers!"

"Yeah, I guess it does! You're not scared?"

Konohamaru shook his head. "It's pretty badass, actually! Hey Naruto, can you teach me some jutsu?"

"Um... sure, I guess."

"Great! I'll call you 'Boss', like your smoky-clone did back in your house!" Konohamaru grinned.

Seeing the perfect shot, Naruto snapped a photo of Konohamaru grinning in his grandfather's lap while his grandfather was still frozen in horror.

"Hey Boss, why'd you take a picture?"

"I'll show you after I get it developed." He turned around and snapped another photo of the two ANBU, sprawled in an undignified manner on the floor.

…

Hiruzen finally unfroze.

"Naruto," he said, "I don't know how to put this, but your father was not the Kyuubi no Kitsune."

"Huh?" said Konohamaru. "You mean the Kyuubi was his _mommy_?"

"Ack! No! Neither of Naruto's parents was anything but human… and… you just pranked me, didn't you?"

Naruto's Cheshire grin said everything.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

How to be a Ninja  
 _by Minato Namikaze_

Chapter 5: A Little Bit of Everything

A good ninja is a well-rounded ninja. A good ninja knows a little bit of every possible ninja art, and is always willing to learn more. And most importantly, a good ninja knows several ways of countering every possible ninja art.

Therefore, in this chapter I have listed every major branch of the ninja arts that I know of along with my thoughts on them.

(Author's Note: so yeah, these are boring even to write and probably even more so to read, so I'll skip 'em.)

Section (a): Ninjutsu (Ninja Chakra Techniques)  
Section (b): Genjutsu (Illusions)  
Section (c): Taijutsu (Unarmed Martial Arts)  
Section (d): Weaponry  
Section (e): Poison  
Section (f): Kekkei Genkai (Bloodline Limits)  
Section (g): Chakra Sensing  
Section (h): Puppetry  
Section (i): Summoning Creatures  
Section (j): Senjutsu (Sage Arts)  
Section (k): Fuinjutsu (Written Seals)

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Author's Notes:

Sorry for the delay in updating. Certain parts of my first draft for this chapter turned out more boring than The Shopping Trip in an Heir!Harry fanfic. So I had to rethink and rewrite. And then my rewrite was better, but I realized the chapter was just filler without a cohesive subplot, so I had to rethink _again,_ and realized I hadn't squashed Mizuki yet, so I ended up adding not one but _two_ subplots… ta-da, hope you like it!

Thank you, thank you, thank you for the reviews! I especially like the ones where some of you just said, "Hahahaha!" Really, those make me smile. And daaaamn! Over one thousand follows! After just four chapters!

As more than one reviewer pointed out, I've drawn a bit of inspiration from A Drop of Poison by Angel of Snapdragons. That story IS one of my favorites, an uncommon gem in which Naruto is both powerful and independent, but he actually EARNS his power through hard work instead of some cop-out method like "oh, Kyuubi is actually friendly and gives him a bloodline", or "oh, Minato is really Madara Uchiha's son and Naruto inherits the Eternal Jutsu-Stealing Eyes Of Doom", or even "hey look, Kami came down to earth and blessed Naruto and gave him a pile of awesome bullshit weapons and swag and – oh yeah – Kami is a hot chick." Anyway, rants aside, the obvious similarities my story has with A Drop of Poison: Naruto creates reinforced Shadow Clones, has his own underground training facility/base, and… one more thing which I shall not state because that would spoil the surprise. That's about it though – the rest of the story, methods, plotline, everything else is proudly original.

Yes, Naruto WILL have a real fight. At some point in the future. Sooner or later. No spoilers!


	6. Chapter 6: Control

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any of the characters in this story.

Chapter 6: Control

"Stop it, that tickles!" giggled Naruto, batting away Konohamaru's hand.

After Naruto had pulled up the top of his orange tracksuit along with his undershirt and molded chakra to show the seal on his stomach, the little boy had jumped off his grandfather's lap and proceeded to poke Naruto's stomach with his eight-year-old fingers.

"How does it work?" asked Konohamaru.

Naruto looked up at the Hokage with a question on his face. Hiruzen smiled and nodded, as if to say, "Go on, explain it to him."

"Well, have you ever used a storage scroll?" asked Naruto, dropping his shirt to cover his belly again.

"No," Konohamaru shook his head, "but I've seen Grampa do it."

Naruto scratched his head for a moment, then pulled a scroll out of a pocket.

"This," said Naruto, "is an empty storage scroll." He unrolled the scroll on the floor, showing an intricate spiral design made out of many, many lines of ink.

Hiruzen's eyes widened in surprise. _That's not a standard storage scroll, that's an Uzumaki seal! Did Naruto make that himself?_ _The paper is new, he couldn't have just found it somewhere._ Then he had another thought. _Letting Konohamaru interrogate Naruto may be the best idea I've had since I stole that crystal ball during the Second Ninja War._

"Now, do you have something to store in the scroll?"

Konohamaru dug in his pocket and pulled out a wooden kunai.

"Perfect," declared Naruto. "Put the kunai on top of the scroll, in the middle of the seal design. Do you know how to channel chakra?"

"Yeah!" grinned Konohamaru, "Like when Sensei taught me the leaf-sticking exercise, right?"

"Exactly," said Naruto. "Put your finger on the seal. Now think, 'I want to put this kunai in the scroll', and channel a bit of chakra into the seal."

With a puff of smoke, the wooden practice kunai vanished into the scroll.

"Now," said Naruto, "this scroll is special. You can actually add a bunch of other things to the scroll without taking the kunai out." Naruto grabbed the chair he had been sitting on, dragged it and put one leg onto the scroll, then sealed the chair into the scroll. "There are three things you have to be careful about. First, you can't store anything living into this scroll, so no hiding people or animals in there. Second, the limit for this scroll is 500 cubic meters of stuff, which is about half the size of this room. So if you find that you can't add something to the scroll, it's probably because it's already full. And third, when you take stuff out again, it all comes out at once, so make sure you have plenty of space to unload it when you do."

"Got it!"

Naruto handed the scroll to Konohamaru. "Okay, now I want you to think, 'I want to take everything out of this scroll' while channeling some chakra into it."

Naruto stood back and Konohamaru unsealed the kunai and chair from the scroll.

"Cool!" shouted Konohamaru.

Naruto rolled up the scroll and handed it to Konohamaru along with the kunai. "Keep it, it's yours."

"Thanks, bro!"

"No problem, Konohamaru. Now, back to our original discussion, can you guess what this seal does?" Naruto lifted his shirt again, showing the Eight Trigrams seal.

"It... turns you into a storage scroll?" said Konohamaru.

"Exactly!" Naruto beamed. "My belly is like a storage scroll that holds a giant, walking, talking fuzzy nine-tailed critter. That's why this seal looks so much different than the seal on the storage scroll: this one is designed to hold Tailed Beasts like the Kyuubi."

"So… if you channel some chakra into the seal, can you get the Kyuubi out again?" asked Konohamaru.

Naruto snorted. "No, actually this one is designed so you can never get Kyuubi out again." This wasn't _entirely_ true, but Naruto was not going to say anything about _that_.

"Konohamaru," said Hiruzen, seriously.

"Yes Gramps?"

"This is important: you must never speak of the Kyuubi being sealed in Naruto to anyone. Not your friends, not your teacher. It's an S-ranked village secret, which means you can actually be put to death for telling the secret. Understand?"

Konohamaru nodded soberly.

"Okay, now why don't you two help me wake up these brave ANBU who seem to have fainted on our floor?"

Hiruzen was answered with two wicked, wicked grins.

"Can we use fire?" asked Konohamaru.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

After waking the two guards in the most embarrassing way possible, Hiruzen sent Konohamaru home with his mother, who, while in ANBU, had fortunately or unfortunately not been one of the two in the room. Then he sent the ANBU to guard the doors of the room from the outside, and used a privacy seal to prevent anyone from hearing.

This left Naruto alone with Hiruzen, who had questions he didn't want his grandson to hear the answers of.

"Naruto, how did you really learn about the Kyuubi?" asked the Hokage.

Naruto thought back to when he was nine years old. "Well..."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

The new underground training room was FINALLY ready to use. Shikamaru, Shino and Naruto had wracked their brains and searched all the libraries they had access to for an Earth jutsu that could hollow out a large space under the bedrock, until Naruto finally came up with the method of using the Hiding Like a Mole Jutsu, which temporarily turns the dirt and rock you are digging through into soft sand, to carve out large chunks of rock and seal them into storage scrolls.

When they had hollowed out a large enough cavern, they smoothed out the walls and floor with multiple Earth Release: Earth-Style Walls, and Naruto had painted chakra-absorbing seals on the walls, ceiling and on the rock below the dirt floor in order to prevent anyone from sensing their training methods. In addition, Naruto had painted seals on the ceiling to keep the air fresh and provide lighting.

The result was a giant underground room, deep below the surface of the bedrock, 120 meters wide in either direction and 30 meters tall. It was glorious.

Today, Naruto was alone in the training hall. With a sense of accomplishment at finishing their project, Shikamaru and Shino had decided to take a couple days off of training. Naruto, on the other hand, was just too excited. He could finally take his training to the next level!

Naruto formed a cross-shaped hand seal with his index fingers. Focusing his chakra, he shouted, "Multi-Shadow Clone Jutsu!"

Two hundred clones appeared in the training hall. Naruto frowned. He didn't even feel tired!

"Okay, everyone spread out! I need more space!" His clones complied. Naruto took a deep breath in and focused as much chakra as he could. "Multi-Shadow Clone Jutsu!"

This time, one thousand new clones appeared in a giant puff of white smoke.

Naruto grinned. Then he toppled over in a dead faint.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Naruto opened his eyes.

He inspected his surroundings. "Huh?"

"Usually when I pass out I either wake up right where I fell, or in a hospital bed. Not to mention…"

He blinked.

"… I'm usually LYING DOWN!"

He had awoken in a concrete sewer tunnel with pipes running overhead, STANDING ankle-deep in water, which strangely enough wasn't dirty like in a normal sewer. He heard growling in the distance.

"Weird. Well," said Naruto, "may as well go check that out."

Instinctively walking atop the water, Naruto took off at a wary jogging speed. Eventually the sewer tunnel entered a large, dark, cavernous room. On one side, there was an enormous pair of doors made of metal bars, like a prison gate. The doors were seemingly held shut by a single piece of paper with kanji for "Seal" written on it. Beyond the doors was darkness.

Until a fearsome killing intent, more than Naruto had ever felt before, had blasted from behind the doors. And an enormous, glowing set of eyes appeared. And a gigantic set of fangs, each tooth taller than Naruto himself. Naruto froze in fear.

" **Hello, human."** said the creature. Its voice reverberated through the room, shaking Naruto's bones.

Naruto jumped back.

"WHAT THE HELL!" shouted Naruto. "It's a giant carnivorous talking bunny-rabbit!"

" **I AM NOT A BUNNY-RABBIT!"** roared the creature. **"I am the great Nine-Tailed Demon Fox, Kyuubi no Kitsune! Bow before me, peon!"**

"Kyuubi?" said Naruto.

...

"You don't look so tough."

" **GRRAAAAAAARGH!"** roared the now-named Kyuubi, slamming into the cage doors.

"Also," said Naruto, "you're definitely a bunny-rabbit. Nothing else has big long cute-looking ears like that." He nodded as if to affirm his conclusion.

" **HOW DARE YOU, YOU KRIFFING SPAWN OF A WOMP RAT AND A HUTT! I AM NOT CUTE!"**

"… you're a Star Wars fan?"

"… **Darth Maul is my favorite character. I bet your favorite is something lame like that whiny fleshbag Luke or the preachy green shrimp, Yoda."**

"Hey, Yoda is totally awesome! But yeaaah... Luke is kinda wimpy. And my favorite character is actually Boba Fett."

" **Boba Fett? Nobody knows anything about him! I'll never understand why people like Boba Fett. He isn't even a real character! He only has like 18 lines in all the Star Wars movies, and most of them are in one of the trashy prequels!"**

"Exactly," explained Naruto, "He's like a ninja. Of course nobody knows anything about him."

" **Whatever. Now what do you want, human? Did you come here to demand some of my power?"** growled Kyuubi.

"Huh? No, I don't want anything. Well, actually I want to know where I am and how I got here. And preferably also how to get out."

"… **you don't want my chakra?"**

"Why would I want your chakra? And isn't it, like, _yours_? How would I be able to use it anyway?"

" **You… don't know, do you?"**

"Know what?"

Kyuubi snorted. **"Nine years ago, that stupid blond fleshbag, your Yondaime, sealed me inside you. Humans with Bijuu sealed inside of them are called Jinchūriki, human sacrifices. Jinchūriki can use their Bijuu's chakra to gain power and become fearsome fighting machines."**

Naruto stopped breathing. "The Yondaime. My father."

"And I'll bet the villagers all knew about it and that's why they call me 'demon' and 'evil' all the time. But I'm not a demon, I'm a human with a… well, you sealed inside me."

"Wait… if you're sealed inside me, how am I talking to you? Is that paper thing holding the doors shut, is that the seal? And where are we?"

" **We are in your mind. I guess you'd call this your mindscape. And yes, that paper represents your control of the seal."**

"So mindscapes are… real? I thought they were only fiction, like in Inception. Wait, Inception has dreamscapes, not mindscapes. Are those real too?"

" **Yes, but there's no time-dilation effect."**

"Cool! But if this is my mindscape, where are my memories? Isn't there supposed to be some representation of my memories somewhere around here? Like, books or glowy-orb-things?"

" **I don't know. This isn't a Harry Potter fanfic. Mindscapes aren't even part of HP canon anyway."**

"Meh, I'll figure it out. So… Jinchūriki. What are the other Jinchūriki like, are they samurai or ninjas?"

" **Hmph. They call themselves ninjas."**

"But… if a human used a Bijuu's chakra, wouldn't they be fighting more or less like a samurai? No swords, but if I used your chakra I'd probably be glowing orange and people would be able to feel the chakra output miles away. Granted, it would be extremely powerful, in a blunt-weapon kind of way. Like a proton torpedo. Everyone could see it coming and everyone would know who it was. Not very ninja-like."

" **True, but that never stopped any of the other ninjas."**

"I don't get it," said Naruto, frowning in thought. "You almost sound like you WANT me to use your chakra."

" **Of course I don't want you to use my chakra! It's MY chakra!"**

"Yes, you do. You've been practically offering it to me this whole time. And you're answering my questions and stuff and more or less acting nice."

" **I AM NOT NICE! I AM A DEMON! I AM THE GREATEST, MOST POWERFUL DEMON IN THE WORLD, I AM EVIL INCARNATE!"**

"Exactly. Which is why it would be INCREDIBLY STUPID for me to take your chakra. I mean seriously, anyone who reads comic books or watches TV or movies knows that using a malevolent source of power, one that you didn't earn, practically makes you a supervillain! I mean, the only good guy I can think of who uses an external source of power is Doctor Strange, and he gets his extra power from Agamotto, who's a nice guy. You're more like Dormammu! Except slightly cooler. And then there's the fact that the badguys who use external sources of nasty power ALWAYS end up getting badly beaten like Baron Mordo or exploding like that Extremis guy in Iron Man 3 or dying when the power leaves them or possessed or eaten within a couple of episodes or by the end of the movie or comic book! It'd be like Spider-man using the alien-symbiote-slime-thing that tries to take him over! I mean, how idiotic and bone-headed would I have to be?"

" **Damn,"** huffed Kyuubi. **"I was hoping you'd fall for that."**

"You're a funny guy, you know," snickered Naruto. "What's your name anyway? 'Kyuubi' is just a description of your nine-tailed form, it's not a name."

" **I'm not telling you my name. Names have power for powerful beings such as I. Just call me Kyuubi."**

Naruto blinked. "Huh, really. I thought that was a fairy-tale thing. Okay, Kyuubi."

Then he changed the subject. "By the way, have you seen the Star Wars movie they released two years ago? Can you even get movies in here?"

" **There's a new one? Really?"**

Who knew? Kyuubi could use the Puppy-Dog Eyes. It would have been effective, especially with the bunny-ears, if he hadn't been five stories tall.

"Man, that really sucks," said Naruto. "Do you know if there's a way I can get you the movie?"

" **If you let me, I can access your senses, so I can see what you see and hear what you hear."**

"Cool! So all I have to do is re-watch the movie! Wait, what about shadow clones? Can you see the memories that come in when a shadow clone is dispelled?"

" **Hmm… if I send a bit of chakra that way… and if you channel your intent into the seal… yeah, probably. I don't think I can access your older memories though."**

"Okay, let's try that! I don't really want to go back and re-watch all the movies that came out in the last nine-years myself."

"… **Thanks, human."**

"I have a name you know! It's Naruto Uzumaki!"

" **Fleshbag."**

"Bunny-rabbit."

" **Stupid blond."**

"Fuzzbutt."

" **Ramen addict."**

"HEY! Don't knock ramen! It's the food of the gods!"

" **I'm a demon."**

"… Good point. What's your favorite food, then?"

" **Chocolate. Dark chocolate. The good kind, not that... _plastic_ from Hershey's."** Kyuubi's face twisted in distaste as he said 'plastic'. **"Preferably German or Swiss."**

"Huh… I would've figured you'd say humans."

" **Humans are alright, but the good ones are rare. I like 'em nice and fat. Daimyo's are especially good."**

"Why'd you attack Konoha then? It's a ninja village, not many fat people."

"… **you wouldn't understand."**

"Try me."

" **Not telling."**

"C'mon…" Naruto pouted. "After all this bonding we did?"

" **Bonding, feh. I was bored."**

"If you don't tell me, I won't let you watch movies."

" **GRRRRR… fine, I'll tell you."**

"Great! I'm listening."

" **...eventually. Now leave, human."**

"But… but… fine. This isn't over, you know. And you haven't even told me how to leave."

" **It's _your_ mind. Just focus on wanting to leave."**

"Oh. Got it. Duh." Naruto turned around as if to leave.

"One more question," said Naruto, turning back. "This is very important. I HAVE to know. Are you a guy or a girl?"

" **Insolent fleshbag,"** growled Kyuubi. He blasted some chakra through the bars, sending Naruto out of his mindscape and into consciousness.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Well…" said Naruto, his mind back in the present. He told Hiruzen, "I made too many shadow clones one time and ended up talking to the Kyuubi in my mind. And that's how I found out Kyuubi was sealed inside me."

"So you can talk to the Kyuubi?"

"Yeah, he's actually pretty cool once you get past the whole 'I want to eat you' thing. And he's definitely a he. I got Kiba to show me how to tell the sex of a dog once, and I snuck up on Kyuubi while he was sleeping. Definitely a dude."

Hiruzen blinked. "Well. That's… you learn something every day." _I really should be used to Naruto's antics by now._

"How old were you when this happened?"

"Um…" Naruto scratched his head. "Nine?"

"By the way, Naruto," said Hiruzen, changing the subject, or perhaps finally getting to the point, "how _did_ you learn the Shadow Clone jutsu? It's a B-rank Forbidden Jutsu, normally only our Jōnin have access to jutsu like that."

"I read it in a book?"

Hiruzen used his Hokage-stare.

Naruto sighed. Then he blanked his face.

"How about you tell me who my parents were and I'll tell you where I learned the Shadow Clone Jutsu."

"Naruto..."

"I know you know. I've always known you were lying when you said you didn't know."

"Are you trying to blackmail me?"

"I deserve to know. They're my parents."

"It's an S-class secret."

"It's an S-class secret _about me_. It should be my secret. And you know I can keep a secret."

"Really, you? Keep a secret? The loudest ninja in Konoha?"

"I've known the Shadow Clone Jutsu for four years, and you just found out _today_. Same with my knowledge of the Kyuubi. And," Naruto narrowed his eyes at Hiruzen, "not even Kakashi-sensei knows I can make my own custom storage scrolls."

 _So he caught that I noticed, did he? Then again, I should have expected it. I wonder if his Academy grades were faked or if he just didn't care what they were, like Shikamaru Nara?_

Hiruzen sighed. "Alright, Naruto. But keep in mind that your parents, both of them, had a large number of enemies. And many of them will not hesitate to strike at you because of who your parents were."

Naruto nodded seriously.

Hiruzen reached down and unlocked a drawer in his desk, eventually pulling out a photo, which he handed to Naruto, who took it greedily.

"Your parents were Minato Namikaze and Kushina Uzumaki, the Yondaime Hokage and his wife."

" _Finally_! It took you long enough," said Naruto. "So that's my mom, huh? She's older than in the other pictures I've seen of her. And she's – oh, she's pregnant."

Hiruzen face-palmed.

"You already knew. You already knew." He sighed. "I should have expected that, right?"

"I'm a _ninja_ , Grampa. And not just that, I'm a teenager! I'm _supposed_ to know things I'm not supposed to know."

"So how did you find out?"

"I read it in a book!"

"You're enjoying this, aren't you."

"Yup! It's nice being the one with all the answers, isn't it?" Naruto grinned. Finally, he unzipped his orange jacket, reached inside and pulled unsealed a book, which he placed on the Hokage's big desk. "That's the book."

"Book?" asked Hiruzen, his eyes traveling back to Naruto's face.

Naruto looked at the book and tapped it with his finger.

With effort, Hiruzen looked back at the book. Then he looked at Naruto again. Naruto nodded and tapped the book again.

"Hold on… KAI!"

"Yup, there's a Genjutsu on the book."

"But it looks like it's just a… KAI! Just an out of date history textbook. And the Genjutsu keeps coming back after I dispel it. KAI!"

"Yup! It's a dual-layered Genjutsu seal. One layer makes it look like a boring history textbook and the other layer makes people want to ignore the book. The only exception is if the person looking at the book is a descendant of both Minato Namikaze and Kushina Uzumaki. On top of that," Naruto sealed the book back into his jacket, "there are security seals that make it so the book will self-destruct if anyone not authorized actually gets past the Genjutsu and tries to open the book."

"So this book..."

"It was written by my Dad and it contains the Namikaze family secrets. He's the one that put the seals on it."

"Ahh… I see. And a few other things, like the Shadow Clone Jutsu, I take it?"

"Yeah. He actually hid it in the Academy library along with a few other places, hoping that his descendants might one day find it. Apparently he was very much aware that the position of Hokage could require him to sacrifice his life for Konoha, and he didn't trust the system to keep his secrets safe and pass them on to his children."

"Minato," said Hiruzen, "you clever, clever boy. What else is in the book?"

Naruto snorted and grinned. "Namikaze family secrets. You might have guessed, a bit of fuinjutsu. And other things."

"Rasengan?"

"Not telling," sang Naruto.

"Hiraishin?"

"Hiraishin? What's that?" Naruto plastered an innocent look on his face that was patently false.

Hiruzen chuckled. "The Chūnin exams are next month. I believe Kakashi plans to enter your team. I look forward to seeing how you do."

"That's nice. I look forward to seeing if I can get through the exams without showing my skills." Naruto grinned.

"Speaking of Kakashi-sensei, could you do me a favor Gramps? Don't tell him about the book. Or the fuinjutsu. He's… he hasn't actually _taught_ us anything. Well, he taught Sasuke and Sakura the tree-walking exercise, but I already knew that. He's more of a team captain than a sensei. So I don't really wanna share my secrets with him. Actually, don't tell _anyone_ about the book."

"I've spoken with Kakashi about the training, actually," said Hiruzen. "I told him to start teaching more. But yes, I'll keep the book a secret. A clan secret, actually. Not many know it, but when someone becomes Hokage, their family, no matter how small, becomes registered as a clan of Konoha, with all the rights and privileges of the founding clans. And if you share clan secrets with other people, those people are actually legally not allowed to share them with others."

"Cool. Thanks Gramps!"

"Alright, I guess I'd better get to this paperwork."

"Okay, see you around old man!"

Naruto left in a puff of smoke.

 _He used Shunshin,_ thought Hiruzen. _So he doesn't know the Hiraishin? Or maybe he knows the Hiraishin, but he used Shunshin to make me think he doesn't know Hiraishin? Dammit, that boy is as good as Ibiki with the mind games._

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Team 7, here for another C-ranked mission," said Kakashi.

It was 10:00 the next morning. Kakashi had shown up to Team 7's meeting spot an hour earlier than normal, and led them to the Hokage Tower via a ridiculously tortuous path.

"Didn't your team just come back from a C-ranked mission?" asked the Chūnin behind the desk, who happened to be Hana Inuzuka. "Regulations state that Genin teams have to do at least fifteen D-ranks for every C-rank. Someone's gotta do those chores."

"Uh… Regulation 352-H, created by the Yondaime Hokage, states that there's an exception to that rule if one or more members of the team are being harassed by yaoi fan-girls."

"Arf!" "Arf!" "Arf!" said the Haimaru triplets, one after the other.

"Bullshit!" said Hana, agreeing with her three ninja-dog partners.

"Bullshit!" said Sakura, agreeing with Hana.

"Hn!" said Sasuke, agreeing with Sakura, but expressing his reluctance at doing so for multiple reasons. It was _amazing_ how much an Uchiha could put into a one-syllable grunt.

Kakashi turned around, where a long row of heavy, polished-leather bound books sat on a shelf on the other side of the room, spanning the entire wall. He pulled out one of the newer books and searched the table of contents.

"There. Rule 352-H: Sakura, read it out loud for us, will you?"

A disbelieving Sakura read, "Officially recognized Ninja Teams, of whom one or more Members have been Harassed by yaoi fan-girls or yaoi fan-boys at any time during the last fifteen (15) days, shall be exempt from any Rule enjoining them to take Missions which require said Team to stay within the borders of Konohagakure."

"That's… awfully specific," said Hana. She grabbed the book to confirm for herself.

"Apparently," Naruto snickered, "the Yondaime had serious problems with yaoi fan-girls when he was a Genin."

Kakashi shivered. "Not just when he was a Genin."

"Alright," growled Hana. "Here are the C-ranked missions."

"The bandit-killing mission," demanded Sasuke, his voice dripping with blood-thirst.

"The bandit-killing mission," agreed Kakashi.

"Okay," said Hana, recording the mission number and the team assigned to it. "One more question."

"Mm-hmm?" said Kakashi.

" _Which_ _one_ _of you is yaoi?_ "

Team 7 vanished so fast that one could be forgiven for assuming Kakashi had taught his students the Shunshin. Or Sasuke and Sakura, at least.

"Quick, Haimaru! After them! We'll sniff out the truth! No one escapes an Inuzuka!" shouted Hana with a disturbing gleam in her eye.

Izumo and Kotetsu stumbled as four figures dashed out of the gates of Konoha, almost blowing them over with the wind of their passage. Team 7 vanished into the distance, Sakura making a double furrow in the ground with her heels as Naruto and Sasuke dragged her backwards by the upper arms.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Hey, Kakashi-sensei, what are the mission details?" asked Naruto once they had finally slowed down. "Are we even heading in the right direction?"

"Eh, don't worry. I opened the top of the scroll while we were running towards the gates. The scroll says that the bandits in question have been attacking merchant caravans near Tanzaku Gai. Intelligence estimates that there are between 25 and 40 bandits in the group, nothing special, just your ordinary bandits like the ones we chased out of Wave. The mission is to wipe them out."

"No hostages to worry about?" asked Naruto.

"No, that would make it a B-ranked mission."

"Lemme guess, you've been carrying camping equipment for a long-term mission outside the village since yesterday."

"Yup," said Kakashi.

"Ohgodohgodohgod," moaned Sakura, "I don't have my stuff!"

"Relax, Sakura," reassured Naruto. "I've got enough supplies to spare, and I'm sure Kakashi-sensei has some to share as well."

"But I don't have my makeup kit! Or a spare change of clothing! What if it rains?"

"We're going on a mission to make what is, for some of us, our first kills," stated Naruto. "And you're worried about _makeup_?"

"First… kills?" Sakura froze.

Naruto sighed. "Kakashi-sensei, maybe we should double around, sneak back into Konoha under Henge? I think Sakura would feel more comfortable if she at least had her own weapons. And this way we won't all be crowded into two tents."

Kakashi considered that if they had to share two tents, either Sasuke would sleep in a tent with Sakura, which could end up in the boy getting molested in his sleep, or Sasuke would share with Kakashi, promoting the awful, awful theory that the two of them were, ugh, involved, or Kakashi would have to share a tent with Sakura, who was a veritable banshee at all times and would probably make him deaf before morning.

"Alright team, consider this evasion training. We'll go forward until the next stream and then we'll use the stream to lose our scent on the way back to Konoha. Hopefully Hana will assume we've used the stream to keep going forward, and will go the other way."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Kakashi and Naruto were waiting outside the gates while Sasuke and Sakura went back in to fetch their weapons, camping equipment and makeup.

"So Kakashi-sensei, you're planning to get Sasuke and Sakura blooded on this mission?"

Kakashi turned his eye on Naruto. "You've already made your first kill?"

Naruto took a deep breath. "I was six. A drunkard followed me onto my apartment roof with a knife. He got me pretty bad, but I managed to shove him over the edge. Old Man Hokage helped me through it."

"I was five," said Kakashi, surprising Naruto. "I was a child prodigy, already a Genin. It was war, so it was essential to get even our Genin into fighting condition as quickly as possible. Sensei took us on a bandit-killing mission just like this one. I killed seven bandits, slashed their throats or buried kunai in their hearts."

"Damn," said Naruto. They were silent after that.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

The team was lucky and saw neither hair nor fur of Hana and her ninja-dogs before they reached Tanzaku Gai the next day. Kakashi stopped at the chief of police's office and obtained the latest information on the location of the bandits, before summoning his own ninja-dogs and tracking down the bandit camp.

"Okay," said Kakashi. "Here's the plan. We'll do this in daylight because you three don't have any experience with nighttime operations. According to my ninja-dogs, there are thirty-one bandits in the camp. Priority is containment, we don't want anyone in the camp getting away. So the first thing we'll do is use stealth and set lethal traps in a 40-meter radius around the camp. Then we'll move in and set another ring of traps in a 30-meter radius. We'll do this in pairs, Sakura, you're with me, and Naruto and Sasuke are together. I'll send Pakkun with Naruto and Sasuke to tell you where to set the traps. If a patrol or a stray bandit leaves the camp, let them leave without seeing you and we'll track them down later. Got it?"

After receiving the affirmative, Kakashi said, "After setting the second circle of traps, each pair will go on the opposite side of the camp and we'll attack in person. The signal to attack will be an explosive kunai in the center of the camp. If at any point you suspect that one of the people in the camp is not there willingly, I want you to knock them out. Otherwise, your orders are to kill. Understood?"

"One more thing. Sakura, when we attack, I'm going to let you take point, and I'll cover your back. Naruto and Sasuke, you two are free to attack in whatever pattern you want, but make sure to watch each others' backs. Now remember, stealth as we approach the camp and complete silence until I give the signal to attack. Ready to go?"

"Ready," said Naruto, calmly.

"Y-yes," said Sakura, with obvious trepidation.

"Hn," said Sasuke, scowling.

"Move out!"

* * *

– CS –

* * *

The smell of booze and campfire smoke was detectable by an un-enhanced human nose even from 40 meters away in the pure air of the forest. The bandit camp itself was fairly quiet; apparently none of the bandits were loud drunks, or maybe the loud drunks weren't drinking at the moment.

Team 7 successfully set both rings of traps without incident, setting up hundreds of meters of tripwires, explosive tags every meter, and poisoned barbed wire. It was two hours of hard, silent work.

Ninja are like slight-of-hand magicians. Nobody ever thinks of the prep work, but without the prep work, the whole act would fall apart.

At last, the hour had arrived and each pairs of ninja snuck up on the clearing. The dogs had de-summoned themselves after guiding the ninja to the assigned locations and pointing them at the camp.

Sasuke took point by mutual consent (not that Sasuke would have accepted it any other way). Naruto breathed regularly as he crouched behind Sasuke, watching as the raven-haired Genin trembled with adrenaline. Naruto wondered why Sasuke would want to take point. Seriously, if he had any sense he would have seen that first, by leaving Naruto to take the rear position Sasuke was comparing him to Kakashi as someone to be relied upon to protect his back, and second, if Sasuke did anything embarrassing, like, say, shaking before the fight, in the rear position he wouldn't have been seen. Egos work in strange ways.

BANG!

That was the signal. Sasuke and Naruto leapt up simultaneously and charged into the center of the camp. Sasuke led with a well-aimed brace of shuriken to the neck of one of the bandits, who was distracted by the initial explosion and went down choking on his own blood.

"NINJA!" shouted one of the bandits, seeing their forehead protectors and the kunai held in Sasuke's left hand. He was quickly silenced by a kunai to the back of the head, thrown by Kakashi.

Naruto frowned as the mission degenerated into a pitched battle. "Back off, Sasuke! Keep them from getting behind us! Fight at range!"

Sasuke didn't listen. He charged into the center of the camp, burying his kunai in the heart of a bandit hadn't yet drawn his sword.

"Fire Release: Great Fireball!" shouted Sasuke, burning another bandit to a crisp. Then he attacked at close range, a kunai in each hand.

"Stupid fucking Uchiha," grumbled Naruto. He rapidly threw kunai left and right, letting Sasuke take on the bandits in front of him and making sure none got behind Sasuke. A dozen armed bandits fell in short order, with the all-purpose ninja knives buried deep in hearts, spines, and heads.

Sasuke clashed with a bandit wielding a katana. He blocked three swift strikes of the man's sword with his kunai before he slipped around and stabbed the man in the heart with the kunai in his other hand. Meanwhile another bandit came up on his left and Sasuke had to duck to avoid a broad horizontal slash. He spun and threw a kunai in the man's stomach while he was open, then followed up by slashing the bandit's throat. A bandit ran out of a tent, sword in hand, and quickly had to duck a brace of shuriken Sasuke produced from his pouch. The last Uchiha dashed forward and engaged with his kunai, not even noticing as another scruffy bandit ran towards his back, only to fall dead from a kunai to the head courtesy of Naruto.

"RUN!" shouted one of the bandits. The nine or ten remaining bandits ran into the trees.

The bandit who had crossed his sword with Sasuke's kunai tried to disengage. Naruto threw a kunai in his brain.

"Naruto! That was my kill!" shouted Sasuke, his habitual scowl deepening.

"Sasuke, you idiot! Look behind you! You don't just charge into the middle of a crowd of enemies like that, it's suicide! If I hadn't been here you'd be dead!"

Sasuke looked around and saw bodies. Far more bodies than he was responsible for.

Then Naruto saw something that made his blood freeze. "SAKURA, NO!"

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Sakura and Kakashi reached their appointed spot and waited to make sure the other pair had time to reach theirs. Sakura was shaking. The wait, as they always say, is the hard part.

Kakashi laid a reassuring hand on her shoulder.

"Breath," he whispered. "In, out. In, out. We're going up against a big crowd of men with swords. Keep them at range, fight along the edge of the camp, remember that the bandits don't have the ability to fight from a distance. Sasuke and Naruto are going to appear from behind that large gray tent, so we're slightly to the right of the opposite side of the camp. I want you to circle to the right, so that if any of us miss with our thrown weapons we won't be throwing them at each other. Now, I'm going to be using minor Genjutsu on any bandits that try to close in with us, so if you see one of them freeze up, don't hesitate and throw a kunai at them. Are you good?"

Sakura nodded and whispered, "I'm good, sensei."

"Okay, here goes." Kakashi threw a kunai with an explosive note tied to the ring.

BANG!

As one, they rose and dashed into the clearing, forward and to the right. Sakura began throwing kunai as soon as she was in range. Her first kunai pierced a man's heart. She didn't look as he fell, moving right on to the next bandit.

"NINJA!" shouted one of the bandits. Sakura didn't even see Kakashi's flying kunai as he took out the possible leader of the bandits.

Sakura saw Sasuke charging into the center of the camp with Naruto following him a small distance behind. Sasuke fiercely attacked the bandits hand-to-hand, until the crowd tried to close in behind him. She watched in shock as Naruto fired off a dozen kunai in the space of a second, wiping out an equal number of bandits with ruthless efficiency, protecting Sasuke's back.

"Sakura, focus!" commanded Kakashi.

Sakura noticed a couple of bandits were charging towards them, swords drawn. They both froze at the same time, caught in Kakashi's Genjutsu. Taking a deep breath, she threw a kunai at each of them, bringing each one down with a pierced heart. She stared as they fell lifeless to the ground.

"RUN!" shouted one of the bandits.

Forcing her gaze away from the two she had killed almost in cold blood, Sakura saw the remaining bandits scatter into the trees. She built up her resolve instantly and gave chase to one of them, forgetting, in the heat of the moment, the last two hours they had spent setting up traps.

"SAKURA, NO!" shouted Kakashi and Naruto in unison.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Sakura chased one of the fleeing bandits through the trees. She was only two meters behind the bandit, and closing fast.

Unfortunately, the bandit was running right into the ring of explosive traps.

With no direct line-of-sight to Sakura, Naruto did the only thing he could. He dashed through the woods at full speed, appeared in front of Sakura, and tackled her to the ground.

BANG! BANG BANG!

In short order, three explosive notes went off, killing the fleeing bandit instantly and throwing him backwards.

"UNGH!" grunted Naruto as the bandit's body landed on top of him and Sakura.

Sakura gave a shrill scream as her arm was broken.

Naruto planted a hand on each side of Sakura and heaved the corpse off of them, standing up. As he did, Kakashi saw how Naruto had survived unhurt. Black liquid slowly disappeared from his skin, a sign of the Earth Release Armor technique which covered the body in a layer of earth-natured chakra.

"Sakura, are you okay?" asked Naruto.

Sakura lifted her broken arm, took a look at it, and passed out.

"Let's see…" said Naruto, "broken arm, lacerations and bruising, some second-degree burns. She'll need treatment after this, but she'll be fine. We can take care of the rest of the bandits first."

Explosions rang out as several of the bandits ran into the lethal traps.

"Alright, Sasuke," ordered Kakashi, "you and me are going to take out the bandits who ran into the woods and didn't get killed by the traps. Naruto, stand watch over Sakura. Do you have enough chakra to create a couple of shadow clones to search the tents?"

In response, Naruto snorted and six shadow clones appeared next to him without a wisp of smoke. As one, they saluted jauntily and said in unison, "You got it, sensei!"

As Kakashi and Sasuke started sweeping the woods, two of the shadow clones started working on a makeshift stretcher using Naruto's hammock and a couple of straight saplings, while the other four clones slashed open the tents. A single scruffy bandit, passed out drunk, lay in one of the tents with his sword by his side. He didn't even twitch as one of the clones buried a kunai in his heart.

Fifteen minutes later, the body count was complete and Team 7 headed back to Tanzaku Gai with a bandaged Sakura on the stretcher, carried by two of Naruto's shadow clones. Naruto produced another twenty clones to dismantle the traps, surprising Kakashi, who couldn't even make ten shadow clones at once.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Hold on," said Naruto as Tanzaku Gai came into sight, "I'll be right back." He vanished in a Shunshin before Kakashi could say anything.

"Hn," said Sasuke, "now the dead-last has abandoned us."

"Stupid Uchiha doesn't know anything," said one of Naruto's clones.

"Yeah," agreed the other clone, "He's the one who'd be dead if the boss didn't have your back."

"You know, I think his ego is bruised," said the first clone.

"Uh-huh, that makes sense," nodded the second clone, "now that he's been shown the extent of his incompetence, he's trying to attack the boss to bring him down to the same level."

"Pretty lame if you ask me," said the first clone.

Kakashi shook his head. Trust Naruto to literally dominate a conversation when he wasn't even there. When did he learn the Shunshin anyway? That was a Chūnin-level technique.

A minute later, Naruto reappeared in a puff of smoke.

"I'm back!" said he.

Another puff of smoke revealed a woman with blonde pigtails. She wore a green haori (open Japanese coat), a jewel in the center of her forehead, and had a figure that was lauded in a thousand perverted fanfics.

"And I brought help!" said Naruto cheerily.

A third puff of smoke revealed another woman, this one with black hair and a more nondescript outfit. She was carrying a piglet.

"And more help!" said Naruto, grinning. "Everyone, this is Auntie Tsunade, this is her apprentice Shizune, and the piggy is Tauntaun. And yes, it's spelled 'Tauntaun', like the creature from Hoth, 'cause Shizune named him! Auntie, Shizune, this is the idiot I told you about, the hurt one is Pinky, and I think you've already met Kakashi-sensei."

Naruto remembered the first time he met Tsunade, two years ago.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

A ten-year-old blond boy was playing poker in a casino in the capital city of the Land of Fire. He had started with just fifty ryo (about $5 in USD) and somehow made his way up to the high-rollers table where the minimum bet was 1 million ryo.

"I'm raising my bet to 250 million," said Naruto. This was his first long trip outside of Konoha, having left several shadow clones to take his place at the Academy so he could explore the Land of Fire.

"All in," said the son of a minor Daimyo from a neighboring nation, sweating. He didn't have 250 million worth of chips.

"Raise to 260 million," said a tough-looking guy who was probably yakuza.

"Raise to 300 million," said a blonde-haired woman.

"Uh… call," said Naruto, pushing an additional pile of chips to match the bet of 300 million ryo.

"Call," said the yakuza guy. "Flush." He put down his cards, revealing that he had five cards of the same suit, but not in order.

"Dammit," said the minor Daimyo's son. "I'm out."

"Four of a kind," said the woman. "Beat that, brat!"

"Uh…" Naruto put his cards down face up, and looked to the casino owner for help, who was standing behind him and watching carefully. "What do you call this?"

"Straight flush," announced the man. "Kid wins. Again."

"Well I know when to cut my losses," said the yakuza guy, picking up his remaining chips and standing up. He left the game, leaving just two remaining players.

"This is outrageous!" shouted the woman. "The brat hasn't even memorized all the winning hands, and he hasn't lost a single hand that he didn't check!"

"I can assure you, ma'am, the boy isn't cheating. I've been watching him closely since the game started. And these cards are chakra-resistant. Even a high-level ninja would be hard pressed to cheat at this table."

"Lady Tsunade," said a harried-looking woman carrying a piglet, standing behind the blonde woman. "Please, that's enough. If you lose any more money we'll be in debt again."

Naruto frowned. "Lady Tsunade?" he asked. "As in Tsunade Senju?"

"Yeah, what of it, brat," said the now-named Tsunade.

Naruto beamed. "You're my Aunt! Your grandma was an Uzumaki, right? My mom was an Uzumaki! That makes you my Aunt! My name is Naruto Uzumaki, dattebayo!"

"Hmph. Distant relation," said Tsunade.

"So what? You're still my closest relative that I know of, Auntie Tsunade."

"Don't call me that!"

"So what's your favorite ramen flavor, Auntie Tsunade?"

"Oh, it is so on, brat. One million. Deal."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

After winning the poker game, Naruto announced, "I wanna learn that game!"

And promptly won at Blackjack.

Then he won at Bingo.

Then he won at Craps.

By the end of the day, Naruto had learned ten new gambling games and gained enough money to buy a small mountain.

The casino had lost a month's worth of profits and gained a new age-restriction rule for gamblers.

Tsunade had lost all her money, forked over half a dozen IOU's to Naruto, and gained a nephew who was going to be the death of her.

"C'mon, Auntie Tsunade!" said Naruto enthusiastically, as they were leaving. "I'll buy you all the ramen you want, just tell me what your favorite flavor is!"

"I don't like ramen. It's unhealthy!"

"I don't believe you. You have Uzumaki blood. You HAVE to like ramen! It was the national food of Uzushiogakure! It's the food of the gods! Ramen makes the world go round!"

Then Naruto smiled evilly. "Hey Shizune, what's Auntie Tsunade's favorite flavor of ramen?"

"Don't. You. Dare." said Tsunade.

Shizune looked conflicted.

"HA!" shouted Naruto, correctly interpreting Shizune's expression. "I knew it! She does like ramen! Hey piggy, what's Auntie's favorite flaver of ramen? Hang on, what's piggy's name anyway?"

"It's Tauntaun," said Shizune with pride.

"Ton-ton?"

"No, no hyphen. And it's spelled T-A-U-N-T-A-U-N."

"Oh. Tauntaun." Naruto frowned for a second. "Ooooh." Then he beamed. "You're a Star Wars fan! He's named after that creature on Hoth that they ride on, right?"

Shizune smiled. "Yes, he is."

"Cool! What's your favorite Star Wars character?"

"I like several of them, but I think Shaak Ti would be my favorite."

"Hmm. Yeah, she's pretty cool, even if she's not really a big fighter unless you go by some of the non-canon material. You know, you're only the second person I've met besides me whose favorite character isn't Luke or Yoda!"

"Really? Who was the other?"

"Oh, it was actually Kyuubi! His favorite character is Darth Maul."

Tsunade and Shizune stopped walking.

"I'm sorry," said Tsunade, "did you say 'Kyuubi'?"

"As in the big nine-tailed carnivorous bunny-rabbit? Yeah, he's a HUGE Star Wars nerd. Did you know he uses the swear words from the Star Wars universe?"

"You're kidding, right?" asked Tsunade, studying his face.

"No, why would I joke about it when the truth is already funnier than anything I could come up with?"

Then Naruto noticed something.

"Hey! We got off topic! I almost forgot. So Tauntaun, what's Auntie Tsunade's favorite type of ramen?"

"Oink, oink. Oink!"

"Really, she likes it with shrimp?"

"Oink! Oink."

"Ah, sometimes chicken-and-shrimp, sometimes beef-and-shrimp." Naruto nodded. "Good choices. My favorite is actually miso ramen, but I always go for variety when I eat."

"Oink."

Naruto sweatdropped. "Uh, no, no, of course I don't! I would _nee_ _e_ _eever_ eat pork ramen."

"Kid, you're pretty weird, you know that right?" said Tsunade.

"Of course! My dream is to be the best ninja in the entire world! Don't you know all the best ninja are eccentric?"

"I don't think it works that way. Normally they become eccentric _after_ becoming outstanding ninja."

"Yeah, but Auntie, if I went about it the _normal_ way, I'd just go from Genin to Chūnin to Jōnin to Sannin and end up as Hokage. Do I look like the kinda guy who wants to sit around doing paperwork all day? You do know I'm skiving off from the Academy right now, don't you?"

Tsunade snorted. "Kid, I think we're going to get along just fine."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"You brought Tsunade. Of the Sannin. To heal a _broken arm_ ," deadpanned Kakashi.

"Well yeah, she's my Auntie! And she was in town," said Naruto.

"Moron," said Sasuke, "you don't have a family."

"Wow," said Tsunade, "he really is an idiot. Kakashi, it's good to see you again. Last time I saw you you were a tetchy little brat the same age as Naruto here. Alright, let's see about the patient."

Naruto's clones lowered Sakura's stretcher onto a smooth spot of grass. Tsunade and Shizune immediately knelt and started with diagnostic and healing jutsu, relinquishing Tauntaun to Naruto.

"Good splint, kept her arm completely immobile. Broken arm… lacerations… bruises… burns… all done! Naruto, you really have to get your chakra control up to medical-nin standards. I can't very well have my nephew running around unable to heal simple stuff like this, can I?"

"I'm trying!" said Naruto. "But my chakra keeps growing, and it's hard enough just keeping my control at the same level all the time. You know how badly I want to be able to use your super-strength."

"I suppose we'll have to wait a few years until you stop growing like a weed. Alright, let's wake her up."

Sakura groaned. "Sasuke, dear, it's too early. Get back in bed."

"If my nephew didn't tell me that you had absolutely zero chances with your 'Sasuke-dear', I'd reprimand you for not being on contraceptives." Tsunade was never one to mince words.

Sakura's eyes shot open. "Wha! Huh? Ohmygosh, the bandits! Naruto... turned into a black guy?"

"The bandit mission is complete," said Naruto, "we got them all. And it's called 'Earth Release Armor'. You coat your body in a layer of Earth-natured chakra" – he demonstrated, still holding Tauntaun – "which gives you a medium-strong defense, good enough against things like those explosive tags you nearly ran into."

Sasuke decided to weigh in again. "Dead-last, show me the hand-seals."

"Sure!" said Naruto in an overly agreeable tone. "Just give me another useful jutsu of equal rank that I don't already know, and I'll teach you the jutsu!"

"When pigs fly," said Sasuke, glancing at Tauntaun.

Shizune shook her head. "I'll never get over the fact that you do all your ninjutsu without hand-seals."

"Of course!" said Naruto. "It makes them so much more useful in battle! And besides, I'm on a team with a wannabe Sharingan user with no sense of honor. Can't have him stealing my jutsu!"

"Hn," said Sasuke. "Uchiha are above honor. Kakashi, make the idiot teach me that jutsu."

Naruto snorted and looked to see what Kakashi's response would be.

"I'm sorry," said Kakashi, reading from an orange book, "did you say something?"

Throughout all this, Sakura was watching and listening. She finally had enough.

"Excuse me," said the pink-haired girl, sitting up on the hammock-stretcher, "but… who are you two?"

"They're the ones who healed you," interjected Naruto. "This is my Aunt, Tsunade Senju, and this is Shizune Kato. She's Auntie Tsunade's apprentice."

"Tsunade… Senju? Tsunade of the Sannin?" asked Sakura, somewhat awed.

"Yes", said Tsunade. "And you, girlie, need to stop dieting, or you'll end up short, weak and ugly. You're an active ninja and a growing girl. You should be eating at least 2,000 calories per day, probably more."

"What?! But I need to look nice for Sasuke."

"And if you keep dieting, you'll end up malnourished and ugly."

"You don't know what you're talking about! Everyone knows dieting makes you look better! What kind of quack doctor are you?" Sakura's preconceived opinions superseded her logic. Her subconscious recognized this fact, and caused her to go on the attack instead of arguing rationally. This, unfortunately, does not make her unusual.

"Is she a Republican?" whispered Shizune to Kakashi.

"Reppu-what-now?" blinked Kakashi, "I don't know what that is, but it sounds vile."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Later, Kakashi took Sakura aside and they had a very tearful, very heartfelt, and very, very standard talk about Sakura's first kill. It was not, however, life-changing, for Sakura STILL wouldn't stop dieting.

Then Kakashi took Sasuke aside and tried to have the same talk, only to run into a solid obsidian wall.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Dead-last, teach me that jutsu," demanded Sasuke. Team 7 was on their way back to Konoha after completing their mission.

"Didn't you hear me before? Teach me something of equal value and I'll trade. It's only fair."

"Hn. I am an Uchiha. You should be grateful, it would be an honor to teach me a jutsu."

Naruto snickered. "You just don't know any C-ranked jutsu besides the Great Fireball, do you? And you don't want to give me your signature jutsu."

"Of course I know other jutsu! I'm not an idiot like you!"

"Oh, and what other jutsu do you know that I don't?"

"… I'll just get the council to make you teach me that jutsu."

"Oh? Sakura, it looks like Sasuke likes Koharu better than you."

"WHAT?!" screamed Sakura. "That stupid, disgusting, pedophiliac, geriatric old HAG! How DARE she make a move on MY Sasuke! GRRR!" She immediately started moving faster through the trees.

Kakashi's mouth twitched under his mask as he breathed out slowly in an attempt to avoid laughing.

Naruto sighed dramatically. "Ah, to what lengths we go for new jutsu. I suppose I'll have to take pity on you and offer an alternative."

…

"And what alternative is that, idiot?" asked Sasuke impatiently.

Naruto grimaced in fake disgust. "I really don't wanna do this. Fine. Give me access to the Uchiha library for twenty-four hours so I can learn something from there, and I'll teach you the jutsu."

"Hn. Deal," said Sasuke, smirking at the thought of Naruto suffering in a library.

 _Daaaaaamn,_ thought Kakashi. _We should get Naruto in the T &I department. He'd get the prisoners singing like __birds_ _and they'd be HAPPY about it._

 _One copy of the_ _entire_ _Uchiha library coming up,_ thought Naruto. Internally, he was laughing evilly.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Two weeks later, Naruto strolled into an village inn on the other side of the Land of Fire.

"Auntie Tsunade! Shizune! Tauntaun! Fancy seeing you here!"

Tsunade shook her head. "Hi Naruto. How did you find us this time?"

"Well there was this weird greenish-yellow guy wearing a top hat and calling himself 'Jimney Cricket', which is funny 'cause I'm pretty sure he was a grasshopper. He said he was my conscience and told me to go here!"

"Really now. And did your 'conscience' tell you to beat me at poker again and take all my money?"

"Eh? No. Not this time at least. I actually brought a present!"

"A present?" Tsunade could be forgiven for looking a little eager. Last time Naruto brought a present, he gave Shizune a real, working lightsaber. The plasma blade was composed of three different elemental chakras: wind, fire and lightning, so it had no elemental weaknesses and could probably even cut through the Raijin.

"Yup, it's not for you though!" said Naruto.

Tsunade pouted. Shizune looked hopeful.

"It's for Tauntaun! See Tauntaun, I made you a present. Wait till you see what it does!"

Shizune's face fell. Tauntaun said, "Oink?".

"Yup," said Naruto, pulling out a bright orange box from somewhere. "Let me help you put it on."

He attached a miniature shoe to each of Tauntaun's cloven feet. Then he pulled out a set of white-feathered angel wings and strapped them to the piglet's back.

"Okay," said Naruto, "now all you have to do is jump."

"Oink?" said Tauntaun.

"Yup, jump. You'll figure out the rest."

Tauntaun jumped into the air. And stayed in the air.

"HA!" shouted Naruto, pumping his fist. "Who says pigs don't fly!"

Tsunade and Shizune just smiled as Tauntaun buzzed around their heads.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

How to be a Ninja

 _by Minato Namikaze_

Chapter 6: Better Chakra Control = Better Ninja

Chakra control makes you better at Ninjutsu, Genjutsu, and any other art that requires the use of chakra. That's obvious. So why don't we teach anything beyond the first step of chakra control at the Academy? I don't know, it's stupid! It's one of the basics that every ninja needs to know regardless of their future specialization.

There's actually a secret many ninja don't know or don't think about: hand seals are simply a crutch to help you control your chakra. The truth is, a ninja who has FULLY mastered a jutsu can control the chakra going into the jutsu without any hand seals at all. This takes an immense amount of practice in order to get the 'muscle memory', so to speak, down perfectly. When this is done, you can spam out jutsu faster than anybody else in the world, use less chakra for each technique, and strike with absolutely no warning about what's coming. Just make sure you don't yell your jutsu's name before striking, because that would defeat the purpose.

The Bijuu, the infamous tailed demons that used to roam the Elemental Nations before they were sealed in human hosts, actually don't use hand seals or any equivalent crutch when fighting. They just spam out fire, wind, lightning, etc., even Bijuudama (Tailed-Beast Balls), their ultimate technique, using sheer chakra control. Although, being the un-subtle creatures they are, some of them like the One-Tailed Racoon-dog are known to actually shout their technique names, as stupid as it is.

Have you heard of the Rasengan, one of my signature jutsu? It's actually a pure chakra-control jutsu. There are no hand-seals for it. It could even be categorized as a chakra-control exercise.

In fact, if your chakra control is good enough, you can actually perform jutsu with parts of your body other than your hands. You could hit someone with a lightning jutsu while kicking them. Or untie yourself using wind blades from your forearm instead of your fingers. I'm still working on forming a Rasengan using my foot.

 **Section (a): Leaf Sticking**

This is the only chakra control exercise that is more or less useless in real life. So if you get bored with this one, stick it out until you've mastered this and can get to exciting stuff!

You probably know this already 'cause it's the one Academy standard exercise. You take a leaf and use your chakra to stick it to your forehead. If it gets blown off your forehead, you're using too much chakra. If it slides down your face and falls off, you're using too little.

I would consider this exercise mastered when you can hold a dozen leaves on various parts of your body (face, arms, hands, legs) without straining yourself.

 **Section (b): Tree Walking**

Woo-hoo! This one is fun. You can walk on vertical surfaces as if they were the ground. You can even walk upside-down on the ceiling. It's a good control exercise because your feet are furthest from your chakra core, making it harder to push and control chakra to that location than anywhere else.

In principle, it's just like the leaf-sticking exercise, except you're sticking yourself to a tree instead of sticking a leaf to yourself. Use too little, and you just slide off and fall. Use too much, and you blast away from the tree. There's an additional trick: in order to move around, you have to turn on and off the chakra flow to each foot when you want to lift a foot and move.

I would consider this exercise mastered when you can spar on a tree or wall, or upside-down on a ceiling.

What many people don't notice is that the tree-walking exercise actually uses chakra to enhance the muscles in your legs. Normally, it would be rather difficult on your calf muscles to stand on a tree, especially walking upwards: your toes are sticking to the tree and your heel is pushing down. Simple physics means that the muscles on the front of your calf have high tension in order to keep you from falling backwards, as well as the quadriceps (front of your thigh) and abdominals, to a lesser extent. Since you're already channeling chakra through your legs, you may not notice these things.

When you've mastered tree-walking, try using it on the ground. It's AMAZING. You'll suddenly find yourself faster and stronger. You'll have no more problems with sliding around on the ground when you make a sudden start or stop. The next thing you know, you'll be wanting to skip ahead to Chapter 7, section (a): Channeling Chakra into Body Parts. But don't, because you need better chakra control first in order to avoid exploding random parts of your body.

 **Section (c): Water Walking**

Walking on water requires… faith. Lots and lots of faith in Jesus.

Just kidding! Channel a constant stream of chakra through your feet into the water. You actually need to focus on three things with your chakra at the same time: first, create enough surface tension to hold up your body. Second, make your foot stick to a chunk of water so your feet don't just slide out from under you, like you would if you were standing on a fun noodle. And third, constantly monitor and correct the amount of chakra you're pushing out in order to account for the flowing water.

I suggest you start with a bathtub full of still water, and try creating surface tension with your hand instead of your foot. It's easier to get the concept down. And do practice with other parts of your body, so you can do flips and rolls while fighting on top of water.

You've mastered this exercise when you can spar on water without losing concentration on your spar.

 **Section (d): Kunai Spinning**

This is a Konoha standard Jōnin level exercise. Float a kunai vertically above your hand using chakra. Don't let it blow away, and don't let it fall onto your hand. Start with the sharp end points at the sky until you've mastered that, then flip it around so you have to focus your chakra on a smaller surface, the point itself. Eventually, you'll be able to make the kunai actually spin while floating it vertically above your hand.

You've mastered this exercise when you can float and spin one kunai above each of your fingers on both hands at the same time.

When you've mastered this, try throwing a kunai at a tree while channeling a bit of extra chakra to give it an extra push after it's left your hand. You'll automatically enhance your throwing arm with chakra, and let's just say the results are totally badass. Your control is now good enough to move on to Chapter 7: Chakra Makes Everything Better, and start channeling chakra into your body parts.

But don't! Because the rest of this chapter is even cooler!

 **Section (e): Freestyle Shape Manipulation**

It's exactly what it sounds like. You control your chakra to form any shape you want, in order to do anything you want, within the limits of your chakra capacity. You can even do this with elemental chakra in order to set things on fire, zap stuff with lighning, and more!

First example, and this is one that is actually popular in the ninja world: Chakra Strings. You make a string out of your chakra and basically use it to reach out and do telekinesis. It's cool. Just be wary of people with Doujutsu and strong chakra sensing abilities, who may be able to cut your chakra strings.

Funnily enough, I can't find any other example of freestyle shape manipulation in the ninja world. So I made my own: the Rasengan (Spiralling Sphere).

Channel some chakra into your palm, and cause it to spin and whirl in many different directions at once, and contain it in a shell of chakra to keep all those chaotic whirling streams of chakra in a sphere.

I've come up with three steps to make it easier to learn this technique. First, hold a water balloon in your hand and use chakra to whirl the water in many directions, causing the balloon to burst.

Second, do the same thing with a rubber ball using just chakra and no water. You'll have to put a lot more power into it in order to get the ball to explode.

Third, put the same amount of power you used in the second step, but keep it contained in a shell of chakra. It helps to use a balloon filled with air in order to tell you when you've made a mistake and failed to keep it contained.

This technique is extremely destructive when used to strike anything. It's been classified as an A-rank jutsu even though it's technically more of a chakra control exercise.

And I still want to do more with it! I want to be able to kick people with a Rasengan formed on my feet. I want to be able to wield it on the end of a chakra string and turn it into a medium-range technique. And I want to create elemental chakra versions of the Rasengan! Imagine how much destructive power you could contain in a fire-natured Rasengan… you could then use a chakra string to throw it at an opponent, and suddenly people would no longer look to Iwa for explosives experts.

I encourage you to come up with your own applications of shape manipulation. See if you can surpass the Rasengan.

 **Section (f): Sensing Foreign Chakra**

Okay, this is a bit off the ball, but this actually does fall into the category of chakra control. By focusing on your chakra, which you've learned to do in all of the chakra control exercises, you can tell the difference between yours and other peoples' chakra. You can even extend your senses around you and 'feel' the chakra of other people, animals, plant life, and even ninjutsu attacks.

It's best to start with some meditation. Block out all your other senses and focus on just your sixth sense of chakra. Feel your own chakra, then focus on the distinction between yours and the chakra around you.

This is actually a Konoha Jōnin standard technique: it's so useful that every Jōnin is required to use it to be able to sense hidden attackers and ambushes. So you can find more information on it in the Ninja Library.

This is also how you detect Genjutsu: you focus your senses on your own chakra pathways, and if there is foreign chakra in your system, you're under a mind-affecting Genjutsu.

You can also suppress your chakra within your body, preventing it from escaping in order to keep other people from sensing you. Again, practice while meditating without any other distractions.

 **Section (g): All About Hand Seals**

When learning jutsu, teaching jutsu, and inventing jutsu, it's usually practical to make use of hand seals for molding chakra and changing its purpose, nature, and shape. Below I've listed all the hand seals I know of, their purposes and uses, and other tricks of the trade.

i. Twelve Standard Seals  
ii. Non-standard Seals  
iii. Create Your Own Hand Seal Jutsu  
iv. One-Handed Sealing  
v. Reducing the Number of Seals for a Jutsu  
vi. Seal-less Execution of Hand Seal Jutsu  
vii. Disguising Jutsu Using the Wrong Hand Seals

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Author's Notes:

So yeah, it's not all fun and games! I got you some drama and action!

Next chapter: Chūnin exams! So much comedic potential… heheheh… got some surprises for you…


	7. Chapter 7: Better, Part I

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any of the characters in this story.

Chapter 7: Better, Part I

Naruto strolled down the street in his orange jumpsuit. Chaos, naturally, followed in his wake.

Sakura and Ino were stalking Naruto. They ducked behind some crates.

"I think he's gonna go do some training next!" whispered Sakura.

"Yeah, he must have done lots of training by himself," agreed Ino, also in a whisper. "Maybe we'll find out what kind of training he does!"

"Uh-huh," nodded Sakura. "I still can't believe he eats ramen for breakfast though."

Ino shook her head. "How is he not fat?! He ate TWELVE bowls of ramen! I don't think even Choji could eat that much. Naruto should be like, twice as big as Choji!"

"He's getting away!" said Sakura, peeking around the boxes. Naruto, in fact, had simply continued walking.

Sakura and Ino dashed along the street into a narrow alley to continue following Naruto.

"Ahem."

Sakura and Ino jumped and looked around wildly.

"Sakura. Ino," said Hinata in a flat tone, emitting a small amount of killing intent. She stood in front of them, hands on her hips.

"Hinata?!" Said girls straightened as if caught doing something wrong. _What happened to the shy, timid Hinata?_

"I see that you have decided to become Naruto fan-girls," stated Hinata, scowling. "I want to make one thing clear. You can follow Naruto. You can talk to Naruto. You can moon over Naruto at all hours of the day and night. _But. Naruto. Is. MINE!_ Got it?"

Hinata's killing intent rose to Chūnin level.

"Got it," agreed Sakura, looking properly chastised.

"Got it," squeaked Ino. _She's scarier than Shikamaru's mom!_

"Good. Now," Hinata peeked around the corner to look for Naruto. Ino and Sakura followed suit.

"Where'd he go?" whispered Ino.

"Oh, no, we've lost him!" whispered Sakura.

"Who are we following?" whispered Naruto.

Hinata whipped around and saw Naruto behind them.

"EEP!" Hinata turned red and fell over in a dead faint.

"Oh dear!" exclaimed Naruto, catching her. "Here we go again."

"Naruto!" said Sakura. "We were, uh..."

"Following Sasuke!" completed Ino.

"Yeah, we were following Sasuke!" said Sakura.

"Poor Sasuke," said Naruto. Then he shrugged. "Meh, who cares? Anyway, Sakura, I came to tell you, Kakashi-sensei just arrived at the team meeting spot."

"What? But it's 7:30 in the morning! Kakashi-sensei never shows up before 10!"

"I know," said Naruto. "Actually it's 7:45. And we're supposed to show up at 8. So he's EARLY. But anyway, we gotta go if we're gonna get there on time."

Sakura frowned. "How do you know he's there if you're here? Weren't you just..."

Ino bonked her on the head.

"Huh?" Naruto looked confused.

"Nothing," said Sakura. "We gotta go, right?"

"Yeah, we gotta go get Sasuke too! Ino, can you watch Hinata until she wakes up? Thanks! Bye!"

Ino looked at Hinata, slumped against the alley wall, as the two members of Team 7 dashed off to their meeting.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"YOU'RE LATE!" said Kakashi exaggeratedly, as Sasuke, Naruto and Sakura walked up to the meeting point at 8:00 sharp. He pointed his finger at his three students and posed in mock outrage.

Sasuke and Sakura face-faulted.

"What the hell?!" shouted Naruto, "People don't face-fault in real life! That only happens in anime!"

"Maybe they've been watching too many episodes of Fairy Tail?" suggested Kakashi, poking a twitching Sasuke.

"Maybe," said Naruto. "There's an awful lot of episodes. What is it, like, almost 300?"

"Almost," agreed Kakashi. "Why do I have a vague feeling of irony? Do you feel that too?"

"WE'RE NOT LATE, YOU'RE EARLY!" shouted Sakura, suddenly standing again and completely ignoring Kakashi and Naruto's discussion.

"Yeah," said Sasuke, "Why are you early?"

"Lemme guess..." said Naruto. "you're entering us into the Chūnin exams."

"Got it in one!" said Kakashi, eye-smiling. "How'd you know?"

"You're holding the application papers in your hand," deadpanned Naruto.

"…good point," admitted Kakashi. He held out the applications. "So, do you three want to enter?"

"Hn," said Sasuke affirmatively, "this is the next step towards killing Itachi."

"If Sasuke is entering, I'm entering too!" Sakura lost all sense of sense when around Sasuke.

"Eh, why not?" said Naruto, shrugging and taking an application form.

"Excellent!" said Kakashi, eye-smiling again. "So, who wants to go for some ramen to celebrate?"

"Yes!" shouted Naruto. "RAMEN! Are you buying?"

Kakashi rolled his eyes. "Yes."

"Naruto, didn't you _just_ eat twelve bowls of ramen twenty ago?" asked Sakura.

"Yeah, so?" said Naruto, ignoring the fact that Sakura was revealing that she had, in fact, been spying on Naruto.

"Too much ramen is bad for you," grumbled Sakura.

"There's no such thing as too much ramen!" declared Naruto. "Ramen is the most amazing food in the entire world! In the beginning, there was darkness. Then Kami said, 'Let there be ramen!' And then there was ramen! And that's how Kami created the universe!"

Kakashi blinked. "Uh, Naruto, I don't think that's _quite_ how it goes."

Naruto was horrified. "Haven't you people ever heard of string theory? The universe is made of the space-time continuum, which is a type of ramen broth, and matter is made up of particles which are really the ends of long strings of ramen noodle!"

Kakashi, Sakura and Sasuke decided not to argue.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Report." said an old man sitting behind a desk in his underground lair. His part of the room was shadowy, but the space in front of his desk, where a masked ninja knelt, was well lit.

"Sir. I followed Team 7 on their bandit killing mission and successfully observed the target's actions without being noticed. Target has excellent kunai throwing skills, probably Jōnin level; he took down twelve bandits in the space of one second, all instant kill shots.

"Subsequently, target displayed high speed in order to save a teammate from serious injury or possible death from an explosive tag trap; again, target's speed was consistent with use of a Shunshin, though I was not close enough to see the accompanying blur and the target did not use the customary distractive smoke or leaves. Target used Earth Release Armor to protect himself from the effects of the explosion, though he was unable to prevent his teammate from suffering a broken arm.

"Target produced six shadow clones at once in order to check the bandits' tents for survivors. When the team headed back to Tanzaku Gai, said shadow clones were set to deconstruct the team's remaining traps.

"Following this, the target used Shunshin, this time with smoke, and returned three and a half minutes later with Tsunade of the Sannin, whom he claimed a familial relationship with, another woman whom he introduced as 'Shizune', and a domesticated pig. At that point, I retreated to avoid being detected in case Tsunade checked for observers using her well-known sensing abilities, and continued observing from a distance. Tsunade healed the injured team member. Then the team re-visited the bandits' camp to collect their packed trap materials and returned to Konoha."

"Hmm. Satisfactory, Hyō," said the old man in the shadows. "This news is very concerning. Order Fū and Torune to report for orders immediately. Send word to Council Members Homura and Koharu that I need to arrange a meeting for important business."

"Yes, Lord Danzo!" The masked ninja vanished in a blur, the telltale sign of a Shunshin.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Naruto, how on earth do you eat so much?" asked Kakashi, sweating. Naruto was on his fifteenth bowl of ramen.

"Oh," said Naruto, "that's simple. I'm eating for two." He patted his belly.

PPPPFFFFFFFFT! Kakashi's spit-take spewed ramen broth all over Ichiraku's stand.

"AHA!" shouted Naruto. "THE MASK IS A GENJUTSU!"

Sakura and Sasuke looked at Naruto strangely.

"What?" said Naruto. "Don't tell me you haven't wondered what's under the mask."

"KAI!" "KAI!" said Sasuke and Sakura in unison.

"Not that kind of Genjutsu," said Naruto, shaking his head. "It's a light-reflecting illusion, like the Academy Clone. Except it's probably anchored to his chakra supply instead of being a separate chakra construct, so you couldn't dispel it even if you smacked him in the face."

"Very good deduction, Naruto," said Kakashi, using his chopsticks to pick up some noodles and eat them slowly, showing the noodles disappearing directly through the apparently-cloth surface of the mask.

"That's freaky, Kakashi-sensei," said Sakura. "And Naruto, where did you learn about this other type of Genjutsu? I didn't even know about that!"

"Uh, Academy Clone? Remember I had a lot of trouble with that jutsu? I did some extra research in the library to help."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Later, Kakashi took Naruto aside.

"Naruto," said Kakashi, completely serious. "You know about the...?"

Naruto got a look on his face that said Kakashi had spoken something totally stupid.

"How could I not, Kakashi-sensei? Have you seen the way the villagers treat me? I heard them talking about the fox years ago."

"Do you know there's a law that prevents people from talking about it?"

Naruto grinned smugly. "I know. It's amazing blackmail material."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

 _Shuffle, shuffle._

Naruto was, once more, walking down the street in his orange jumpsuit.

 _Shuffle, shuffle, shuffle._

A bush was following him.

 _Shuffle, shuffle._

That's right, a bush. A big round green shrub about a meter and a half tall was shuffling along in his wake. Naruto stopped and turned around.

"Hey, Konohamaru," said Naruto as if the eight-year-old wasn't trying to hide in a bush. "Who are your friends?"

FOOOM! The shrub went up in a huge ball of flames.

"Ow ow ow!" shouted a little girl with messy orange pigtails, jumping back from the fire.

"Kono, you used too much lighter fluid!" shouted a boy with round glasses, limp brown hair and a permanently dopey look on his face.

"Ehehehe, sorry!" said Konohamaru. Then he hissed, "Guys, we're supposed to do the introduction!"

"Oh, right!" said the girl.

"I'm Moegi!"

"I'm Udon!"

"I'm Konohamaru! And together, we're…"

"The Konohamaru Corpse!" they shouted in unison. It was extremely cheesy, as in oh-Kami-kill-me-now-this-is-so-embarrassing cheesy.

"Cool!" shouted Naruto. "But… that last word is 'corps', pronounced like 'apple core'. The way you said it, it means 'dead body'."

"Aw, we practiced that so many times." complained Udon.

"'s okay," said Naruto. "You'll get it right next time."

"Yeah, we'll get it next time!" declared Konohamaru. "So boss, will you play ninja with us?"

Naruto blinked at the sudden change in subject. He thought for a minute. Then he grinned.

"Sure!" said Naruto. "I have the perfect idea for a mission! Gather round and I'll explain."

The three kids formed a close circle with Naruto and leaned in to hear his plan.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Sakura and Ino were, once again, following Naruto in hopes of catching him training. Hinata was with them, following Naruto in hopes of catching him as a boyfriend (though somehow without actually talking to him). They dashed from shadow to shadow, staying out of sight.

"Psst."

The three of them turned around. Standing behind them was a girl about their age with bright yellow-blonde pigtails, sun-kissed skin, and a body that could only be described as "hot". In other words, her bust was _way_ too big for a twelve- or thirteen-year-old.

"Kikyo?" said Hinata.

"President!" greeted the new blonde, cheerfully. "Are these two new club members?"

Hinata sighed. "Kikyo, meet Ino and Sakura. Ino, Sakura, meet Kikyo, the self-appointed Vice-President of the Naruto fan-club, and until today, the _only_ other member."

"Sweet! Nice to meet you," said Kikyo. "So, what's our sexy hunk doing?"

"Hang on," said Sakura.

"We're not Naruto fan-girls," said Ino.

"Huh? You're not? Then why are you following him?" asked Kikyo.

Ino and Sakura looked at each other.

"We're trying to find out what he does for training," said Sakura.

"Have you considered just going up and asking him?" suggested Kikyo.

"Have you considered just going up and asking him for a date?" asked Ino.

Hinata and Kikyo blushed. "Good point," they said, in unison.

"So," said Sakura, "Naruto was just talking to some little kids. One of them was the Hokage's grandson, right?"

"Yup," confirmed Ino. "I heard him agree to play ninja with them."

The four of them peeked around the corner.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Okay, here's the plan," said Naruto. "You see, I have a few people stalking me. We," he waved his hand around to include all four of them in the plan, "are going to stalk _them_ and find out why they're stalking me."

"Sounds good, boss!" said Konohamaru.

"But boss," said Moegi, "how are we going to hide and follow them if they're watching us right now?"

"Good thinking! We'll need a distraction," said Naruto. "Can you guys do the Clone Jutsu?"

"I can," said Konohamaru.

Moegi and Udon shook their heads "no".

"That's okay," said Naruto. "I'll just make some clones that look like you two. Okay, first thing is we need to do is wait until they're looking away from us. As soon as they're looking away, we'll make the clones, and we'll sneak away and come up behind them. Got it?"

The Konohamaru Corps nodded their heads.

"Alright. Look at the reflection of the store window behind me. Can you see the three girls in the alley peeking out at us?"

"Yeah! I see them, boss!" whispered Konohamaru.

"Good," said Naruto, pulling out a small mirror and cupping it in his hand so he could watch the store window. "When I say go, follow my lead."

A blonde-pigtailed girl appeared in the alley and distracted the three stalkers.

"Go!" whispered Naruto. "Konohamaru, make your clone!"

Konohamaru ran through the hand signs and produced a perfect Academy clone. Naruto did the same and produced three Academy clones, one of which was a copy of himself and the other two copies of Moegi and Udon.

"Okay, follow me! Konohamaru, make your clone look like he's talking with the others like we were just now."

The four of them dashed into an alley. They circled around, climbed a fire escape, and eventually reached the top of one of the buildings that made up the alley the girls hid in. Naruto grinned at the other three, putting his finger to his lips in the universal signal for 'silence'. Then he peeked over the edge.

Moegi grinned, and peeked over the edge. Udon grinned, sucked up some snot, and peeked over the edge. Konohamaru was sweating. He had to maintain concentration on his clone while climbing a fire escape and following Naruto. He caught his breath, grinned, and peeked as well. This was exciting!

" _So_ ," they heard Sakura say, " _Naruto was just talking to some little kids. One of them was the Hokage's grandson, right?_ "

" _Yup_ ," came Ino's voice. " _I heard him agree to play ninja with them._ "

The four stalkers in the alley below peeked around the edge, looking at the four clones which stood huddled together down the street, apparently in a quiet discussion.

" _Who plays ninja with little kids anyway?_ " commented Sakura, " _We're real ninja, why would he want to play a stupid kids' game?_ "

That was when it all went to hell. Konohamaru lost concentration on his clone for a moment.

"Hang on," whispered Ino. "Did the Hokage's grandson just… flicker?"

"I saw that too!" whispered Hinata. "Byakugan! They're all clones!"

"But where are the real ones?" asked Sakura.

Hinata looked around for a moment. Then she gasped and looked up.

Naruto waved. Hinata fainted.

Konohamaru decided he didn't need the clone anymore, so he dropped it. Then he yelled, "Hey! Playing ninja is not stupid!"

"Yeah!" chimed in Moegi. "Aren't you playing ninja too?"

"Why were you following :sniff: the Boss?" asked Udon.

"None of your business!" shouted Sakura, shaking her fist at them.

"Hey Boss," said Konohamaru, "is she a _fangirl_? You told me about fangirls, they're _ugly."_

" _A_ nd _stupid_ ," said Moegi.

"And they follow around people who don't like them," said Udon.

"Konohamaru," said Naruto.

"Yeah Boss?"

"Remember the _other_ thing I said about fangirls?"

"Uh..."

"They're _scary_."

Sakura growled and started running up the side of the building.

"RUN!" shouted Naruto. And they ran. Across rooftops, down fire escapes, through alleys, through crowds. Konohamaru bumped into a weird-looking teenager wearing pajamas and makeup, but Naruto picked him up in no time and they kept running, ignoring the "Hey!" of the strangely dressed boy. Still, the pink-haired banshee followed.

"I'LL GET YOU BRATS!" screamed Sakura.

Konohamaru shouted, "I know! C'mon, this way!" and dashed off in a different direction. They weaved off towards the Hokage tower.

"Grampa, protect us!" puffed Konohamaru, bursting into the Hokage's office. The other three dashed in behind him and slammed the door.

Hiruzen looked up from his paperwork. "From what?"

"Crazy," puffed Udon.

"Fangirl," puffed Moegi.

They heard a BANG! BANG! on the door.

"YOU CAN'T HIDE FROM ME BRAT!"

"Oh, no! She's here!" whispered Naruto, looking around the room with a terrified look on his face. He produced two shadow clones, and each of the three Naruto's grabbed an eight-year-old and leapt into the rafters of the high ceiling.

"Shh!" cautioned the three Naruto's, each one putting a finger on the lips of the Academy student he was holding while hanging upside-down from the ceiling.

Just in time too, as the doors came down with an almighty CRASH!

"WHERE ARE THEY?!" screamed Sakura, stomping into the room.

The Hokage raised an eyebrow at Sakura from behind his desk.

"Uh..." Sakura gulped.

"Ahem," said Hiruzen, staring sternly at Sakura.

"Sorry Lord Hokage!" squeaked Sakura, and she dashed out of the room at a speed that was rather impressive for a Genin.

"Phew," said Naruto.

"That was close," said Moegi.

"Hi Mr. ANBU," said Konohamaru, waving at an ANBU who was hanging upside-down from the ceiling in front of him. You could practically feel the ANBU's amusement.

The Naruto-clone holding Udon chipped in. "Can we get down from here before Udon's snot-string reaches all the way to the floor?"

Naruto shrugged and produced another clone. The new clone made the hand-seals for a Water jutsu and said, "Snot Release: Snot Dragon no Jutsu!"

Udon's snot-drip expanded, turned into an Oriental dragon-shaped snot missile, detached itself from his nose, whirled around, and flew out the window. Moegi, Hiruzen and the ANBU looked faintly repulsed. Udon and Konohamaru looked at Naruto like he was the second coming of the Sage. Everyone ignored the cry of outrage from somewhere in the village.

The three Naruto's walked down the wall.

"Uh, sorry about the door Gramps," said Naruto.

"Oh, don't worry about it," said Hiruzen, smiling. "The Yondaime had the doors made so that they wouldn't be damaged if someone smashed them down. Watch." He performed some hand seals and the doors flew back into their places.

"Seriously? He invented a jutsu just to fix the office doors?"

"When Tsunade was in the village, she smashed them down two or three times a week."

"Oh," Naruto nodded, "Yeah, I can imagine that."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Back in the alley, Kikyo watched as Hinata headed home, no longer able to stalk the boy she liked. The blonde-haired girl _shifted_ , revealing the form of one of Naruto's clones.

The Naruto-clone pursed his lips for a second, wondering if being the vice-president of his own fan-club was a sign of insanity.

Then he dispersed in a puff of smoke.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

One week later, Sakura, Sasuke and Naruto showed up at the building where the Chūnin exams were to be held.

"C'mon," said Naruto. "Let's go around the back and use the window."

Sakura took a swipe at Naruto's head. "Why would we do that, idiot?"

Naruto ducked the swipe and said, "What? Kakashi-sensei does it all the time. He says, 'Real ninja don't use doors.'"

"Hn," said Sasuke, rather appropriately for once. "If we did what Kakashi does all the time we'd be 'lost on the road of life'."

"Fine," said Naruto, "You win this one."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"My name is Rock Lee! You are Sakura, are you not? Will you go on a date with me?" asked the mini-Guy clone in green spandex, a bowl haircut and big, fat caterpillar eyebrows. His teeth sparkled as he grinned.

"Absolutely… NOT!"

Lee instantly sank into a comical depression. "Please… at least tell me why?"

Sakura blinked at the sudden change in mood. "I like Sasuke!"

Lee's mood changed again. "Sasuke… of the Uchiha clan? You are Sasuke Uchiha, the genius and Rookie of the Year? I challenge you to a match! YOSH! Let us test each other in youthful battle to see which is the better ninja!"

"Hn. I accept." Sasuke was itching to test himself against someone strong, and this green-clad Genin had just effortlessly stopped his strongest kick.

The surrounding teams, who had been trying and failing to get past the two Chūnin guards' Genjutsu, watched interestedly. Naruto, taking in the situation, snickered.

"Alright, everyone clear a space!" announced Naruto. "Come one! Come all! We are about to witness a match between two manly men whose hearts belong to the beautiful Sakura! The winner will get to go on a date with the lady! Are these terms acceptable to all parties?"

Lee looked surprised, but he grinned. "Indeed, Naruto, these terms are most youthful! I accept!"

"Hn," said Sasuke, trying to ignore Naruto's antics.

"I'll take that as a 'yes'! Sakura?"

Sakura's brain finally caught up. "CHA! SASUKE WILL BEAT THAT FREAK IN FIVE SECONDS! GO SASUKE! OOOOOH I'M GONNA GO ON A DATE WITH SASUKE-DEAR! SQUEEEEEEE!"

"Uh… I'll take that as a 'yes'?"

Sasuke glowered at Naruto and opened his mouth to say something. Unfortunately, he was interrupted.

"YOSH! NARUTO, WILL YOU START THE MATCH?" Lee was in an unusual Taijutsu stance, with one arm straight out in front of him, palm up.

"Alright, warriors, are you ready? Begin!"

Sasuke growled. But he focused on his opponent, clenched his fists, and charged Lee.

Lee blocked Sasuke's punch and kicked him in the jaw with all his strength. It was an instant knockout.

"Winner… Lee." deadpanned Naruto, like he had seen it coming all along. Which he had.

Lee appeared in front of Sakura again and grabbed her hand. "SAKURA! I HAVE DEFEATED MY OPPONENT! WHERE WOULD YOU LIKE TO GO ON OUR DATE!" His huge bushy eyebrows wiggled in her face.

"EEEEK! I SAID NO!" Sakura raised her fist and pounded Lee on the head, knocking him to the floor.

"They're both so loud," said a disguised Kotetsu, who had been watching the match with everyone else.

"And they both hit so hard," said a similarly disguised Izumo.

"It's like a match made in heaven," said Kotetsu, sarcastically.

"Imagine the kids," said Izumo, not so sarcastically.

They both imagined a couple of mini-Lees shouting and screaming and running around in green spandex with bowl cuts and bushy eyebrows… in pink.

"Aaagh! I need brain bleach!" exclaimed Kotetsu.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Sasuke groaned as slowly became conscious. Why did his head hurt so much? And what was that annoying voice? Scratch that, what were those annoying _voices_?

"Are you okay, Sasuke dear?" asked Sakura's voice.

"Eh, he's okay," said Naruto's voice, sounding oddly strangled. "He's better off than us," said Naruto. "At least he missed the Sunset of Youth."

Oh yeah, Guy had shown up while Sasuke was knocked out.

"Don't remind me Naruto! It was bad enough watching it once! I don't need to suffer flashbacks!"

Sasuke suddenly noticed that Sakura's voice was oddly close. He opened his eyes.

"GAH!" shouted Sasuke when he realized his head was on Sakura's lap. He shot to his feet and backed away quickly.

Naruto snickered. He seemed to be snickering a lot lately.

"Look at the time!" said Naruto. "We gotta go."

Indeed, they only had five minutes to get up to the next floor and into the testing room.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Meanwhile, deep underground in a secret meeting room...

"You summoned us, Danzo?" said Koharu.

The three Konoha Council elders, Koharu, Homura and Danzo, sat around a polished table in very comfy meeting chairs.

"Yes," said Danzo. "I am concerned about the loyalty of our Jinchūriki. I have received reliable reports that indicate he has received training from persons unknown..."

None of the three noticed the small brown ant in a corner of the ceiling.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Team 7 entered the exam hall just in time to hear the examiner, Ibiki Morino, yell at the Genin to shut up and take their seats. They quickly joined the rest in shuffling into their seats.

Naruto listened to the rules and read the questions on his test sheet. Honestly, for a guy who had read the _entire_ Konoha Shinobi Library, those questions weren't difficult at all. But the real test was clearly something else.

Naruto quickly came to a decision. He filled out eight of the nine questions with purposefully incorrect answers, and filled in one question on the back of the sheet with the correct answer. Then he placed the sheet face up on his desk so that anyone peeking at his sheet would only see wrong answers, yawned, slumped in his seat, and closed his eyes.

He ignored the killing intent sent his way by dozens of Genin who were decidedly not impressed by his show of boredom. He ignored the erasers thrown at him by Sasuke and Sakura. He even pretended to sleep through the explanation of the tenth question.

BANG! Ibiki's fist came down on Naruto's desk. "WAKE UP, BRAT!"

Naruto yawned and stretched.

"Good morning, beautiful," said Naruto, smiling blissfully.

Ibiki raised his killing intent.

"What up?" said Naruto, blinking and looking around. Everyone was staring at him. "Oh. Is the test over?"

Ibiki stared at Naruto. Then he snorted and said, "You pass."

"WHAT?!" shouted several of the other Genin who were waiting for the tenth question.

"You all pass," said Ibiki.

"But you didn't give us the tenth question," said someone.

"I don't get it," wondered Naruto. "Mr. Proctor said we passed. Why are you objecting? Do you not want to pass?"

"I… argh, I just want to know why, idiot!"

Ibiki explained that the tenth question was to test whether they had the nerve to put their careers on the line.

"But why did you let the idiot pass? He was sleeping through the whole thing!"

"Are you questioning me?" Ibiki glared. It was even scarier with his bandanna off and his scars showing.

Naruto grinned – he liked this guy! Most people would have explained, but Ibiki, apparently, really did know the value of information. Plus he was cool.

Then something crashed through the window. A banner unfurled and got pinned to the ceiling with two kunai, and a purple-haired woman in risqué clothing appeared from inside the banner.

"Heads up, boys and girls! This is no time to be celebrating! I'll be your next proctor, Anko Mitarashi! You ready for the second test? Good, then let's go! Follow me!"

Silence.

"That was awesome, dattebayo!" shouted Naruto, pumping his fist.

Anko grinned. "Glad to know someone appreciates my entrances!"

Naruto pulled out a white card with a '9' on it and held it up.

"What? Only a nine out of ten? What gives?" asked Anko, pouting.

Naruto pointed a finger at Anko. "You need more orange!" he declared.

Anko made a hand sign and performed a Henge. Her trench coat turned the same brilliant orange as Naruto's jumpsuit.

"Like this?" she asked, grinning.

"That's perfect!" said Naruto, switching his '9' card for one that said '10'.

"Oh Kami, there's two of them," groaned Sakura.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"The second part of the test has begun!" shouted Anko, her trench coat still a blinding orange.

Twenty-three teams of Genin dashed into the forest, each from a separate gate.

Team 7 stopped a little way into the forest.

"Alright guys, let's head straight for the tower," said Naruto.

"What? Why should we do that, Naruto?" said Sakura.

Naruto shrugged and pulled out a Heaven and an Earth scroll.

"What? When did you get that Earth scroll?" asked Sakura in shock.

"When we received our Heaven scroll, of course. Some team out there was given a fake." Naruto grinned like a fox.

Sasuke objected to Naruto's proposal. "I still want to test myself against some of the other teams."

"Seriously Sasuke? You want to risk the lives of your teammates so you can have fun?" drawled Naruto.

"Hn. It's not like any of them are strong enough to hurt me."

Naruto snickered. "That big purple bruise on your chin says otherwise. And too bad, 'cuz I ain't giving you a choice."

Naruto vanished and reappeared behind Sasuke and Sakura. He grabbed each of them with an arm around the back, and all three blurred away in a Shunshin.

Now the Shunshin (Body Flicker) technique involves wrapping chakra around the outside of your body and using it to propel yourself in a straight line at an extreme speed. Anyone without powerfully enhanced vision, such as a Sharingan, sees no more than a blur. It also tends to give the user tunnel vision, and usually requires hand-seals, so it is mostly useless in a fight against mid-to-upper-level opponents. That is, of course, unless you had enhanced vision (like a Sharingan, again) and practiced until you could do the jutsu without hand-seals, like Shisui Uchiha… or Naruto, who channeled chakra into his eyes and optic nerves until he could see very well indeed.

Neither Sakura, who had no dojutsu or vision-enhancing techniques, nor Sasuke, who had not yet awakened his Sharingan, were prepared for the sudden extreme speed, and they weren't even looking in the right direction to see where they were going.

"AAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!" screamed Sakura all the way to the tower as Naruto rapidly made one Shunshin jump after another. Sasuke managed to stay silent. Barely.

Both of them retched and emptied their stomachs when they reached the tower.

Meanwhile, Naruto unfurled the scrolls. Iruka appeared.

"The Nidaime was responsible for creating many of the traditional institutions of Konoha," lectured Iruka, "including the Shinobi Academy, the ANBU corps, the T&I department, and the Chūnin exams. Alright class, time for a pop quiz… NARUTO?!"

"Hi Iruka-sensei!" Naruto waved his hand and grinned.

"Wha…?" Iruka looked around. Then he looked down and saw the unrolled Heaven and Earth scrolls. "You finished the Second Stage ALREADY?"

"Yup!" Naruto nodded. "Just in time to save your poor students from a pop quiz!"

"You finished in what..." Iruka looked at the clock, "less than a minute?!"

"Forty seconds, actually!" chirped Naruto. "You just didn't notice after we summoned you for about fifteen seconds."

"How on earth did you do that?" demanded Iruka. He knew Naruto was capable of getting away with some pretty crazy stuff due to his pranks, but this should be impossible even for Jōnin.

"Never underestimate the power of the invincible Uchiha!" declared Naruto.

Iruka looked at Naruto's two teammates, who had just finished emptying their stomachs and were giving death glares to Naruto.

"Hey, look!" said Naruto. "He activated his spinny-eye-thingy!"

Iruka looked at Sasuke's eyes, which had turned red and had one tomoe (comma-shaped mark) each. "It's called the Sharingan, Naruto. And what, pray tell, did you do to the 'invincible Uchiha' to make him activate his Sharingan and throw up?"

"I dunno," said Naruto, shrugging innocently. "We got here and they just started retching for some reason."

"Pull the other one," said Iruka. He was well used to the 'innocent' face Naruto used after a prank.

Naruto snickered. "Surprise Shunshin trip."

"Well that certainly explains the barfing. Wait, you know the Shunshin?"

Naruto grinned and used a smoke Shunshin to move two meters to one side. Then he Shunshined back. When he reappeared in a second puff of smoke, he was holding a plate.

"Want some dango?" offered Naruto.

Iruka blinked. "Uh… sure. Where'd you get the dango?"

Just then, they all heard a distant female voice scream, "WHO STOLE MY DANGO?!"

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Yo," said Naruto, an hour and a half later.

Facing him was a girl with four short blonde pigtails and a long rectangular box-shaped object attached to her back, a taller boy wearing purple face-paint and wearing a large wrapped package on his back, and a boy who was even shorter than Naruto carrying an enormous sand-colored gourd on his back. This team apparently liked carrying big things on their backs.

"The Sabakus, am I right? Naruto Uzumaki, nice to meet you. You guys got here fast."

"Temari Sabaku," the girl said politely. "And not as fast as you, apparently."

"Kankuro Sabaku," said makeup-boy.

"I am Gaara Sabaku," said gourd-boy. "Mother wants your blood." Gaara was leaking killing intent and demonic chakra.

Naruto quirked an eyebrow. "She wants my blood? What for? And how much does she want?"

"Mother wants to drink your blood. And she says…" Gaara blinked slowly, dropping the killing intent, "A little bit will do."

"Hmm. Well I wouldn't object to letting her have a little bit, as long as she isn't going to use it to, like, break into my security seals or something. And blood's not cheap, so if she wants more than a couple drops I'm going to have to ask for something in exchange."

Temari and Kankuro gaped.

Gaara's brow scrunched in a confused expression. "Does your mother want my blood?"

"No, no, nothing like that," said Naruto. "I want information."

"This exchange is acceptable," said Gaara after some thought.

"Wait..." said Temari.

Gaara shut her up with a glare.

"Uh, usually you ask what information someone is asking for before you agree to give it away," said Naruto.

"Very well. What information are you asking for?"

"Well," said Naruto. "What's your mother's name? It seems like you have a demon sealed inside you – is she your mother? And are you leaking demonic chakra on purpose or is your seal faulty?"

"Mother is the demon of the sand. She says her name is… Shukaku." Gaara pronounced the name slowly, as if it was the first time he spoke it. "I am leaking demonic chakra?"

"Yeah, just a bit. Anyone with the ability to sense chakra could find you in no time. It also tends to scare away animals and make most people slightly uneasy around you. Maybe we can get permission to look at your seal and, if necessary, fix it? Suna is allies with Konoha, you know."

"If the seal is fixed, will I be able to sleep?"

Naruto was horrified. "You can't sleep?"

"If I sleep, Mother takes over."

"Well, we definitely need to your seal looked at then. If we fix it, you will be able to sleep with no problems. Unfortunately, I don't think Suna would be very happy if a Konoha ninja messed with your seal without permission, so we probably should ask first. I don't see why they would refuse though."

"I will ask Baki-sensei."

"Great!" said Naruto, smiling. "Now, blood!" He unsealed a drinking glass. Using a kunai, Naruto cut open his palm without so much as a wince and filled the glass halfway before the blood stopped coming from the wound. Naruto wrapped a bandage around his palm to hide the fact that the wound was closing by itself.

"Is that enough?" asked Naruto.

In answer, a thick tendril of sand reached out of Gaara's gourd and took the glass from Naruto's hand. Moments later, the sand covered the glass completely and crushed it, letting the blood soak into the sand.

"Did Shukaku find out anything from my blood?" asked Naruto, watching curiously.

Gaara stared at Naruto and blinked slowly. "Nine?" he asked.

Naruto nodded solemnly.

"Also," said Gaara, "you're type A positive and you have some kind of chakra-based bloodline, though Mother cannot tell if it's activated or not. And the Y chromosome says you're definitely male."

"That's good to know, thanks!" said Naruto happily.

Temari could no longer contain herself. "You're both _really_ weird, you know that right?"

"Of course!" said Naruto. "Whoah – deja vu?"

Kankuro cracked up.

"Hey! You're wearing cat pajamas and purple makeup! You're weirder than we are!"

Kankuro stopped laughing instantly and glared at Naruto. " _What_ did you just say?"

"Kankuro," said Gaara flatly, "you're wearing cat pajamas and purple makeup."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Anko Mitarashi was _beyond_ _pissed_. Not only did someone murder three Grass Genin, that someone was _Orochimaru_ , her former sensei. Adding to her anger was the fact that said former sensei had masqueraded as a Genin and more or less got the jump on her during her introduction to the Second Phase of the Exam. And worst of all, SOMEONE STOLE HER DANGO!

Anko rocketed through the Forest of Death, searching for Orochimaru's chakra signature.

Giant tigers, spiders and bears ran away or hid as she passed.

 _There! That foul purple chakra! And he's not alone!_

"OROCHIMARU!" screamed Anko.

"Ku, ku, ku, ku!" laughed Orochimaru in a creepy sibilant voice, still wearing the female Grass Genin's face. "Little Anko, look at you, one of the elite..." And then he turned around and looked at Anko.

"You're wearing… orange? Where the _fuck_ did you find something so... blinding?"

"Just… one… question… before… I… KILL YOU." ground out Anko, releasing all her chakra and killing intent at once.

"I'm afraid I'm going to have to turn you down," said Orochimaru, smirking. "I still have to find that little Uchiha boy and gift him with my seal. But I'll humor you for a moment. What question do you have for your dear old sensei?"

"DID. YOU. STEAL. MY. DANGO?!"

If his stolen face were not already bloodless, Orochimaru would have paled – he knew how Anko was when it came to dango. As it was, he did the first thing that came to mind.

"Kabuto, stall her!" ordered Orochimaru. Then he turned tail and ran.

Anko flew at Orochimaru. She was forced to finally take notice of his companion as Kabuto intercepted her with glowing Chakra Scalpels.

"Anko Mitarashi," said Kabuto in a very stereotypical warriors' introduction. "Special Jōnin of Konoha. Former student of Lord Orochimaru and the only other summoner of the Snake Contract. You're good, but let's see how you do against someone of the same caliber as Kakashi the Copy-nin."

Comparing himself to Kakashi… might have been a bit arrogant. And little did Kabuto know, even Kakashi feared to steal Anko's dango.

"GRAAAAAAH!" screamed Anko. "Fire Release: Fire Dragon! Striking Shadow Snakes! Poison Mist!" She threw scores of senbon needles and kunai. "Kunai Shadow Clone no Jutsu! Fire Release: Fire Dragon! Wind Release: Great Breakthrough!"

Kabuto dodged the first fire dragon, disabled the snakes with his Chakra Scalpels, and ignored the Poison Mist. He blocked or dodged all of the kunai but was struck with several poisoned senbon. He used a Kawarimi to escape the massively multiplied kunai when Anko used the Kunai Shadow Clone technique. And that was when his luck ran out.

Anko's second Fire Dragon was aimed at the ground where Kabuto appeared, and her wind jutsu slammed into the Fire Dragon from behind, causing a massive explosion of fire that Kabuto was caught in. He tried to dodge, but he went down with his legs charred, and most of his torso and one of his arms covered in third-degree burns.

Anko spared a glance in the direction Orochimaru had run. She knew how fast that bastard could be when he was running away, so there was no chance of catching up with him. So she figured a rat in the hand is worth two in a hole.

Kabuto's screams rang through the night. It turned out to be very, very handy to have a prisoner who could heal himself when you sliced bits off of him.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Team 10 hid in the bushes as a team from Takigakure (Village Hidden by a Waterfall) landed in the clearing where they had stood moments earlier. Shikamaru peered out through a crack at their feet.

 _Perfect! They're all facing away from us!_

"Kagemane (Shadow Imitation) success," said Shikamaru. "Attack plan 1! Go!"

"What? Why can't I move!"

Ino and Choji were surprised by the sudden change of pace from hiding to attack, but they performed as ordered. Ino knelt from behind the low bushes and used her family's jutsu to take over one of the team. Shikamaru released that one while Ino used his body to knock out the other two. Finally, Choji used his Human Boulder attack to smash into the one Ino had used an instant after she released her jutsu. It was a classic Ino-Shika-Cho ambush.

"Perfect," said Choji, searching the Taki team's packs as the other two stood guard. "Found some chocolate! And granola bars."

Ino groaned. "Just find their scroll already!"

"Oh, yeah, they've got a Heaven scroll. I found that a few minutes ago."

Shikamaru rolled his eyes. "Now that we've got a Heaven and an Earth scroll, all we need to do is get to the tower. Choji, hide that scroll."

"Okay," said Choji, and they moved off.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Team 10 heard a shrill cry on their way to the Tower.

"Hey, where did everyone go!"

Shikamaru prepared to direct the team on a detour to avoid the commotion when he heard a loud thumping and a deep, beastly roar.

"Someone's in trouble, and not from another team," said Shikamaru. "Shall we check it out?"

Ino looked unsure. That growl sounded scary.

"It could be one of our friends," said Choji.

"Let's go then!" agreed Ino.

It turned out to be an enormous, three-story-tall bear chasing a redheaded girl who looked to be about a year younger than the members of Team 10. She had just tripped on a root.

Shikamaru ran through the full hand seals of his family's signature jutsu. "Kagemane no Jutsu!" he shouted, attacking with his shadow.

The bear froze. Then it growled.

"Ino, I can't hold it for long! See if you can possess it!"

"Shintenshin (Mind Body Switch) no Jutsu!" shouted Ino. Her body immediately collapsed as she took control of the bear.

Shikamaru dropped control of his technique, and Ino turned the bear around, trying to make it lumber off into the woods.

Then the bear roared and reared up on its hind legs.

Ino gasped. "There's something wrong with it's mind! I can't possess it properly!"

"Shit," said Shikamaru. "This is gonna be such a drag. Alright, I need a good-sized rock… there, got one!"

As the huge bear turned around and faced the team again, Shikamaru picked up a large rock about the size of his head and shifted it to his left hand, holding it at shoulder height. He made a one-handed seal with his right hand, and blurred in a Shunshin.

WHUMP!

Blood sprayed from the side of the bear's head and it was knocked sideways. Shikamaru reappeared in the air twenty meters away from the bear, no longer holding the rock. He fell to the ground and rolled

Ino gaped.

"Damn, Shika, where'd you learn to do that?"

"Shunshin? I learned it from a scroll. Good way of getting places without having to walk." This was, in fact true; Shikamaru had actually learned it from a scroll and taught Naruto and Shino.

"Did you just kill that bear by _throwing a rock at it_?!" said Ino.

"Yup," said Shikamaru. He approached the redheaded girl they had just saved. "Hey, are you alright?"

"Y-yes," said the girl, retrieving her glasses and standing up. "Thank you for saving me."

"It was no trouble," said Shikamaru. Then he realized what he'd said. "I mean, it was very troublesome but we're glad we did it."

The girl giggled and blushed. "I'm Karin Uzumaki. What's your name?"

"Uzumaki? Uh, I'm Shikamaru Nara. Did you know the Uzumaki clan heir is a Konoha ninja?"

Karin blinked in surprise. "Really? Do you think I can meet him?"

"Remember the loud blond guy wearing orange who slept through the first phase? Naruto Uzumaki."

"He seemed kind of stupid. Are you sure he's the clan heir?"

"Ino can tell you that Naruto was only pretending to be stupid. Right Ino?"

"Um, yeah I think so. It's kind of hard to tell sometimes. Shikamaru, how did you do that with the rock? Shunshin isn't meant to do that."

Shikamaru sighed. "Troublesome. To perform the Shunshin, you wrap chakra around your body and propel yourself in a straight line at high speed. In order to stop yourself again, you have to apply the same force in an opposite direction with your chakra when you reach your destination – simple physics. All I did was neglect to wrap chakra around the rock when I stopped myself at the end of the Shunshin, and the rock kept flying at full speed.

"Anyway, Karin, what happened to your team?"

Karin looked nervous. "They… well, they left me behind."

"They left you to get eaten by a bear?" asked Choji.

"Well, their plan was for me to act as bait. That's why I was carrying our Earth scroll in the open. But when the bear came, I think they ran away."

"Well," said Shikamaru, "sorry to say it sounds like your team won't be passing. If they think you've been eaten by a bear, they won't come back for you, which means your best bet is to come with us to the Tower. Or – hang on a sec."

Shikamaru reached into a pocket and pulled out a card with a seal inscribed on it. He channeled chakra into it and held it to his ear.

"Naruto?" said Shikamaru. "It's Shika… Of _course_ you've finished the Second Phase already… We've discovered a little cousin of yours and rescued her from a bear… Yes, cousin. She says she's an Uzumaki. Got the hair for it too, unlike you… Well it looks like her team has abandoned her and they probably think she's been eaten, so I'm thinking… Yeah, my location, any time now would be good."

Shikamaru took the card off his ear and stuck it back in his pocket. Moments later, Naruto appeared.

"Yo," said Naruto. "Hi Shika. Ino. Choji. Whoah, bear. Well, looks like we got enough to feed Choji. And you must be the Uzumaki Shikamaru mentioned… I'm Naruto Uzumaki, it's nice to meet you."

"Hi. I'm Karin Uzumaki. Are you really the clan heir? And what happened to all the orange?"

Naruto chuckled. "I don't wear orange when I'm on a serious mission. As for the clan heir thing… well, my mom was Kushina Uzumaki."

"The Princess of Whirlpool! Mom told me about her." Karin's face turned sad.

"Is your mom…?" asked Shikamaru.

Karin nodded sadly. "She passed away four years ago. Those Kusagakure (Grass village) doctors killed her! They drained her chakra until she died."

"She had the healing chakra bloodline?" asked Naruto.

"Yes, so do I," said Karin. She showed her arm, which had faint human bite marks in various places.

"I take it you don't want to go back to Kusa?" said Naruto, his face impassive.

Karin looked hopeful. "Won't they make me a missing nin?"

Naruto and Shikamaru looked at each other, smirked, and spoke in unison. "Not if we fake your death."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

After sealing the bear in a scroll and modifying the scene to look like the bear had swallowed Karin and walked away, as well as erasing all traces of Team 10's passage, it was time to leave.

"Welp, I guess my shadow clone will see you guys at the Tower in half an hour or so. Word of warning: Sasuke has his Sharingan now, so be careful with the hand-seals."

"What'd you do, hit him with your full killing intent?" joked Shikamaru.

"Surprise Shunshin trip. All the way through the forest."

"Lemme guess. You stole Anko's dango and you wanted to make sure you were out of the blast radius."

Naruto grinned. "You know me too well."

"Where are you taking Karin?" asked Ino.

"Ah-ah-ah. First rule of keeping secrets: don't tell people your secrets."

"Can I have the bear?" asked Choji.

Naruto threw him the scroll containing the bear. "Make sure you give Shika one of the eye-teeth. He killed it, it's tradition."

"Seriously, Naruto?" said Shikamaru. "Those teeth are huge. It's not like I can put it on a necklace."

"Then turn it into a hat or something."

"Will I see Shikamaru again?" asked Karin.

"Probably," said Naruto. "Me and Shika are good friends. Not for awhile though. We gotta change your look, make sure the Kusa people don't catch on that you're alive. Why?"

Karin blushed, stepped up to Shikamaru, and kissed him on the cheek. "Thank you," she whispered.

Shikamaru froze, eyes wide. He blushed, and his hand went to his cheek where Karin had kissed him.

"Wow," said Naruto. He grinned. "Alright, see you guys later. Ino, remember, _this is not gossip_. Don't tell _anyone_ , especially not Sakura. Got it?"

Ino pouted.

"Ino…"

"Fine, I got it Naruto."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Alright, Karin," said Naruto once they were alone. "Hang tight and close your eyes. I'm gonna take you to meet our Aunt."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

 **Author's Notes:**

I'll stop it here. I'd originally planned to include the Preliminaries in this chapter, but this chapter is already long enough and I didn't want to leave you guys for another week without an update. Also, I haven't decided who should fight whom in the preliminaries. I want to use uncommon matchups for the sake of originality, but I also want to make sure certain people end up in the finals.

You may have noticed that I haven't included the next chapter of Minato's book, "Chapter 7: Chakra Makes Everything Better", and I've named the chapter "Better, Part I". This is because the following chapters after the Chūnin Exam Preliminaries will match the themes of Minato's Chapter 8 and 9.

I'm aware that my description of Shunshin contradicts Narutopedia. According to Narutopedia, Shunshin "uses chakra to temporarily vitalize the body and move at extreme speeds." This does not make sense to me: in the anime, you see people using Shunshin while kneeling and holding a hand-seal. Not exactly something you do if you're gonna take off running at high speed. Besides, if it really were just a method of internally enhancing your body with chakra, we'd see a lot more people ripping up the ground when they start and stop. Maybe also ripping up their clothes due to air resistance.

I am actually considering changing my mind and giving Naruto a romantic pairing. Problem is, I need to find or create a female character who is strong enough for Naruto to respect (not necessarily "strong" as in physically, but definitely "strong" in mind and spirit, enough to be an equal for Naruto). Most of the girls we know in Konoha do not measure up, despite my modifications to Hinata, Sakura and Ino. Hinata… let's be honest, she's pathetic. (Sorry Hinata, you have my pity, and we can be friends, but pity is a rather awful basis for romance.) Sakura… two words, "domestic violence". Ino… still a fangirl, has years before she could grow up enough for Naruto. Ayame Ichiraku, Hana Inuzuka… too old at this point in time, a 5 year age difference is okay if you're in your 20's but not when Naruto is just going through puberty. Same problem with all the older female ninja in the village. Temari… maybe, but she does come off as rather cruel during the Chūnin Exams arc in canon, but I've changed her a bit. Tenten… has potential. She's a serious warrior, if not exactly the embodiment of "ninja"… unfortunately, all the members of Team Guy are stupidly one-dimensional fighters: they pick a discipline and never use anything else. There are also some potential candidates outside the village, though I don't know them as well. Could go the OC route but it's harder to make it funny that way, and I refuse to cop out and bring in a crossover character. Any suggestions, arguments?

Also… WOW! Over 2,200 follows and over 2,000 favs! Broke into the top 10 most followed and favorited Naruto Parody fics on this site! I never imagined my fic would become so popular. To celebrate… I give you omakes!

* * *

– CS: Omakes –

* * *

 **OMAKE #1:** _A deleted scene written when I was contemplating writing a long, boring training montage for the first four chapters…_ _Anyway, this is in line with the storyline of the fic, it's just not a necessary part of the story and if I had included it I would have felt obligated to provide a thorough history of Naruto's Academy years._

The sun was a horrible, horrible invention. It shined right through Naruto's eyelids and woke him up regardless of his continued sleepiness.

Then he remembered.

The book! He sprang up in bed, looking at the night-table where the book lay. Naruto had stayed up most of the night reading the ENTIRE little book. He didn't understand a lot of it, yet, but he'd read every single page searching for clues on who his parents were and what they were like. Yes, he'd come to the conclusion that the Yondaime Hokage had to be his father. He'd even written down the dates based on the history book and his own age, and concluded that if the Minato was his grandfather, then he would have had to be a father at the age of 14, and Minato's son would have had Naruto when he was also 14… to an eight-year-old, 14 sounded rather old, but Naruto was quite clear on the fact that it was too young to be a father. He, of course, didn't understand that this was for social and moral reasons and that it was actually biologically possible. Not that it mattered in this case.

Therefore, Naruto's father was his hero, the Yondaime Hokage. The Yellow Flash of the Leaf, the coolest and most powerful of all the Hokages.

And apparently he didn't like being Hokage. Now _that_ was quite a revelation. But Naruto realized that every time he'd seen his Grandpa, the Sandaime (Third) Hokage, in his office, the old man was sitting at his desk doing… paperwork. Why had he never realized it before? Being Hokage was like having to do homework all day, every day! Why would _anybody_ want to do that?

Naruto still wanted to become the strongest ninja in the village, but he had to avoid becoming Hokage. That second chapter, "Secrets and Lies", was going to be invaluable. Just like all the training tips in the other chapters of the book! Naruto couldn't wait to get started!

Then Naruto remembered something. He had class today. And it was 11:00 AM. Yikes! He'd missed the entire first two periods of the day!

* * *

– CS: Omake #1 –

* * *

A week later, the Hokage made his monthly visit to Naruto's apartment.

"Grandpa!" shouted Naruto, when he heard the knock on his door. No one else knocked politely on his door. Everyone else either avoided him like the plague or just busted down his door when they wanted to vandalize his apartment. Or just rudely walked in, in the case of the landlord.

Naruto opened the door and, sure enough, there stood the Hokage, in his robes and without his hat. Naruto gave him a hug and led him to the couch to sit.

"Hey Gramps, I have a question. Do you know who my parents were?"

Hiruzen considered for a moment, then he said, "No, Naruto, I'm afraid I don't know who your parents were. You were found after the Kyuubi attack eight years ago."

Naruto's face fell. Then he prodded, "What do you suppose they were like, Grampa? Were they ninja?"

"I'm sure they were awesome ninja, Naruto. They probably gave their lives defending the village from the Kyuubi."

 _Well_ , thought Naruto somewhat petulantly _, if you won't tell me secrets about myself, then I'm not gonna tell you my secrets._

"Hey Gramps?"

"Yes Naruto?"

"Someday, I'm gonna be the best ninja in the entire world!"

The Hokage smiled. "That's wonderful, Naruto. By the way, I brought you a present."

"Really? What is it?!"

Hiruzen pulled out a package wrapped in bright orange paper and handed it to Naruto.

Naruto ripped it open with gusto, only to find… an alarm clock.

* * *

– CS: Omake #1 –

* * *

In the coming months, Naruto would re-read his father's book many times over. He would close his curtains at night, lock the doors, and practice chakra control with leaves and pieces of paper, walking up the walls (his already damaged walls gained a large number of new dents and strange smashes) and eventually, filling the bathtub and walking on the water. It was a good thing that he had no neighbors in the dingy apartment building he lived in, or they might have come knocking.

It was right around the time that he was mastering his variant of the tree-climbing exercise that he first managed the Henge (Transformation) Jutsu. Naruto quickly found out something that his father hadn't written in his book: Henge can be used to transform objects, not just yourself. All you have to do is be touching the object and coat it with chakra before using the Henge technique. It was actually rather obvious: the most common use of the Henge was to transform yourself, _including your clothes_ , into another person. Clothes which aren't part of you, and are not special in any way (it's not like they made chakra-conductive clothing or something). So all Naruto had to do was put an object like, say, his library card, in his pocket and think of it like his clothes – _this is a part of me, I'll use my chakra to transform it_ _and change the name on my library card_ _along with the rest of me_ – and he could transform the object in his hand. Just like that, he had access to the Academy library under an invented name and face that got right past the stupid Chūnin librarian. Not that even a Jōnin would have been able to detect his Henge: it's much harder to find something wrong with a transformation if there's no original to compare it to.

It was a very small leap of logic to learn that he could also transform an object he was touching WITHOUT transforming himself. Well, to be more accurate, his body was covered in a puff of smoke, signifying that he was under the Henge, but he still looked the same. He would have to improve his chakra control a LOT before he could do the technique without wasting chakra and producing smoke. That would be awesome though: pick up a rock in the middle of a fight, seamlessly transform it into a kunai, and voila – instant weapon.

With Henge, Naruto could find an unused training ground and train there without getting kicked out and without letting anyone know how advanced he was. He carefully used it to increase his height and apparent age so that his advanced training would not appear suspicious.

* * *

– CS: Omakes –

* * *

 **OMAKE #2:** _An alternate ending to the scene in the Hokage's office._

"Sorry Lord Hokage!" squeaked Sakura, and she dashed out of the Hokage's office at a speed that was rather impressive for a Genin.

"Phew," said Naruto.

"That was close," said Moegi.

"Hi Mom," said Konohamaru, waving at an ANBU who was hanging upside-down from the ceiling in front of him and staring at him through her mask. You could feel her amusement.

"She's your Mom?" asked Udon, his perpetual drip of snot hanging the wrong way up.

"Hi, Konohamaru's Mom," said Moegi, waving from where she was being held in a Naruto-clone's arm.

The ANBU face-palmed. "Konnie, you're not supposed to let people know who I am when I'm wearing the mask."

Konohamaru pouted. "Don't call me Konnie!"

Naruto snickered.

"Don't you DARE!"

"Konnie. I like it!" declared Moegi. Udon nodded, making his now three-foot-long snot-string swing dangerously.

Konohamaru stuck out his tongue.

Then the blonde-pigtailed fangirl from the alley walked in the smashed doors.

"Sorry Gramps," said she. "I didn't know she would smash down the doors."

Hiruzen said, "It's okay, the Yondaime had the doors made so that they wouldn't be damaged if someone smashed them down. Watch." He performed some hand seals and the doors flew back into their places.

"Cool!" said Naruto from the ceiling.

"Boss! You gave us away!" shouted Konohamaru.

"Nah," said Naruto. "No need to worry about Kikyo. She's not a crazy fangirl." Naruto and the clones walked down the walls to the floor and placed the three Academy students on their feet before the clones dispersed.

"Huh?" asked Konohamaru. "You mean there are other kinds of fangirls that aren't crazy?"

"Uh… no, not that I know of. But you see, she's me."

"What do you mean she's you?"

Naruto pointed at the blonde girl, who made a hand-seal and said, "Kai." A puff of smoke and she turned into Naruto.

"I'm a Naruto shadow-clone under a Henge."

Konohamaru, Moegi, and Udon gaped. Hiruzen chuckled.

"And I'm the vice-president of the Naruto fan-club!" said the Naruto-clone proudly, once again in the blonde-pigtailed 'hot girl' Henge and holding up two fingers in a 'V' sign.

"Boss, lemme get this straight. You're the _vice-president_ of your _own fan-club_?"

Naruto nodded, grinning smugly.

"That's disturbing," deadpanned Konohamaru.

* * *

– CS: Omakes –

* * *

 **OMAKE #3:** _An alternate_ _recipient_ _for Kubikiribōchō._

"Lee!" shouted Naruto, entering the training ground where Team Guy practised.

"Naruto, my eternal rival! Have you come to spar with me?" said Lee, jogging up to Naruto. And then jogging in place in front of Naruto.

"Not today, my most youthful friend!" said Naruto. "I brought you a gift!"

"A gift?" said Lee, still jogging.

"Indeed," said Naruto, unfurling a sealing scroll. "I present to you… Kubikiribōchō!" And he unsealed the eight-foot-long sword and handed it to Lee.

"YOSH! This is a most youthful gift!" said Lee. He gave it a couple of experimental swings with his right hand. Then he shouted, "YOUTH!" and dashed forwards, bringing down twenty trees with a single swing.

Tenten showed up.

"Why are you giving it to Lee?" pouted Tenten.

"Well," said Naruto, "the last guy who owned that sword had no eyebrows. So I'm hoping that combining the sword's apparent ability to remove eyebrows, and Lee's impossibly bushy eyebrows, will result in some perfectly normal eyebrows."

"That's… that's brilliant!" said Tenten, with a look of awe on her face. "If it works, it might almost be worth it."

"That, and it really fits his fighting style better than yours. You're more of a precision and finesse fighter, while Lee is all brute strength and speed, which is the only thing that sword requires."

"That actually makes sense," sighed Tenten, grudgingly. "But it's just… it's one of the legendary weapons of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist! I want one!"

"Sorry," said Naruto. "But there's another one that would suit you better, right?"

Tenten brightened. "Yeah! Kabutowari, the Helmet Splitter! It's got a giant hammer on one end and an axe on the other end, connected by a leather rope! It's unpredictable, really difficult to wield, and totally awesome!"

The two of them just stood silently for a minute, watching Lee denuding the training ground of trees.

"Hey Naruto," said Tenten, "do you think Kubikiribōchō would work on Guy-sensei's eyebrows?"

Naruto shook his head. "Sorry," he said mournfully, "That one needs professional help."


	8. Chapter 8: Better, Part II

Disclaimer: Naruto and all the characters in this story are owned by Masashi Kishimoto.

Author's Note: I'm back! Sorry for the almost three-month break between chapters. I got caught up with moving to a new residence, holiday celebrations, a Harry Potter crossover-reading binge, and an annoying bit of writer's block. But I finally got the next chapter out!

 **Chapter 8: Better, Part II**

"Perhaps it would be best," said Homura, "if Koharu and I take care of spreading the rumors. Your ROOT ninja are… not the most adept at social skills."

"Indeed," agreed Koharu, "Not that they aren't excellent ninja, Danzo, but they do come across as rather robotic. If we want this to seem like a grassroots motion, we cannot risk suspicion."

Danzo narrowed his eye. "I suppose that would be best," said he, "although I was hoping to avoid forcing you to go on an active mission at your advanced age."

"Bah," said Koharu. "My bones may be old, but I'll be on my deathbed before I cannot perform a simple Henge."

"Very well," said Danzo, "You have one month. We'll execute the final phase of the plan on August 2nd at the Council meeting for the Chūnin promotions. By that time, we need all the council members on our side."

Koharu and Homura left the meeting room and made their way out of the underground hideout.

Danzo snapped his fingers. A ROOT ninja Shunshined in front of him and knelt.

"Sir."

"In one month's time we will add a Jinchūriki to the ranks. Prepare a holding cell and chakra-resistant restraints. We will need to alter our standard conditioning regime to control the beast sealed in the boy. Take every precaution, we do not want it getting free."

"Yes sir."

"Dismissed."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

In Tsunade's learned opinion, the best ramen in the world could be found in the Land of Vegetables. Interestingly enough, most people seemed to expect the Land of Noodles to have good ramen, but the truth was, noodles could be transported practically anywhere without losing their quality, while vegetables couldn't. And the country Tsunade and Shizune were visiting now, as its name implied, grew the best vegetables in the world.

Which is why the two of them, along with Tauntaun, were sitting in a small restaurant in the Land of Vegetables, having dinner.

"I'll have a stir-fry, please," ordered Shizune.

"One chicken-and-shrimp ramen, please," ordered Tsunade. The waitress made a note and left to pass their orders to the kitchen.

Shizune smiled. "Ramen, huh? If Naruto could see you now..."

"Shut up," said Tsunade, scanning the room. "If you talk about him, he might appear. You know he always shows up when we're eating, drinking, or gambling."

"Who always shows up when you're eating, drinking, or gambling, Auntie Tsunade?" asked Naruto. "And did I hear the word 'ramen'?"

Tsunade blinked, surprised despite herself. "Naruto, how did you find us this time?"

"Oh, it's simple!" said Naruto, grinning smugly. "You were thinking of ramen, which naturally led to thinking of your favorite nephew, and I could feel the love from all the way over in Konoha, so I came!"

"See, Shizune? Speak of the devil, and he shall appear. Well, Naruto, are you going to introduce your friend?"

"Oh right, sorry. Aunt Tsunade, Shizune, this is Karin Uzumaki. Karin, this is Tsunade Senju and Shizune Kato. And that's Tauntaun."

"Tsunade of the Sannin is your aunt?!" squeaked Karin.

"Uh, yeah, and apparently she's your aunt too. Or cousin or something like that. Auntie, don't you have some sort of DNA or chakra test to find out how closely we're related?"

Tsunade got the message; Naruto wanted her to confirm that Karin was actually an Uzumaki. "Hmph," she said. "Something like that. Now have a seat, brats. Karin, what's your favorite type of ramen?"

Shizune and Naruto looked at each other and smirked. "Nice to see you're finally embracing the Uzumaki blood, Auntie," said Naruto.

"Don't be like that," said Tsunade. "Naruto, I don't know if you've ever been here before, but the Land of Vegetables has the best ramen in the entire world. So I make an exception whenever I come here."

"What? No way. Ichiraku's has the best ramen in the world."

"Kid, I've had Ichiraku's. It's not bad, but the stuff they make here is on another level."

"W-wait," interjected Karin. "The Land of Vegetables? Isn't that on the other side of the Land of Water?"

"Yup!" said Naruto. "Welcome to the Land of Veggies!"

"But we were just in Konoha!"

"Yup! And now we're here!"

"But… how?"

"It's one of the mysteries of the universe. We were there, and now we're here, but no time has passed between. It is not for us to know, nor is it for us to ask, how this has come to pass. For us, only to give thanks and praise the ramen," said Naruto devoutly.

"Now you're just being ridiculous," said Karin.

"Anyway," said Naruto, turning to Tsunade and forcibly changing the subject. "I was hoping you could keep Karin with you until the end of the Chūnin exams. She was… unwillingly conscripted by Kusagakure and, while Shika and I managed to fake her death, it's best if we keep her away from Grass ninja for awhile."

"And what do I get out of this, brat?"

"Um… she has the Uzumaki healing chakra?"

It was Tsunade's turn to gape. "Damn, kid. Alright. Karin, you've got one month to show me that you're apprentice material. Now, what's your favorite kind of ramen?"

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Anko arrived on the top floor of the Forest of Death's central tower with a leaf Shunshin.

"Lord Hokage," she addressed the village leader, dropping a hogtied Kabuto like a sack of rice, "I have urgent news."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

On the second day of the Chūnin exams, Naruto was summoned to the hideout by his spy clone.

"Report," said Naruto, once again seated in a meditative position on his couch.

"We have multiple important and urgent alerts," said the spy clone, covered in black cloth with only his eyes showing. "First, Anko Mitarashi, the Second Phase proctor, reported to the Hokage that she discovered Orochimaru, the traitor Sannin, in the Forest of Death yesterday. She captured Kabuto Yakushi, who appears to be working for Orochimaru, when Orochimaru fled and used Kabuto as a distraction for Anko. She proceeded to do a field interrogation of Kabuto and discovered that Oto, under Orochimaru, intends to invade Konoha with the assistance of Suna. Suna's motives are unclear, Kabuto did not know how Orochimaru convinced them to join. The plan was to attack during the final phase of the Chūnin Exams, using Gaara Sabaku's bijuu, the One-Tailed Raccoon-Dog, to sow chaos and trigger the invasion. We'll have to take into account the fact that Orochimaru may alter his plans due to Kabuto's capture.

"On a related note, if you steal Anko's dango again, _don't get caught_.

"Next alert. The Hokage assigned a Chūnin to go undercover and get himself hired at the Whirlwind Postal office. Whirlwind will need to turn him away with a suitable excuse.

"Final alert. Koharu, Homura, and Danzo had a rather interesting meeting yesterday. As expected, Danzo received the report from that drone you noticed tailing you during the Tanzaku Gai mission with Konoha Team 7. In addition, we've got some information his spies picked up, and his plans concerning yourself. Probably best if you just review the memories yourself."

Naruto closed his eyes, nodded, and the clone dispelled in a puff of smoke. It was twenty minutes before he opened his eyes and called out, "Training! Apprentices! Whirlwind!"

"You called, boss?" The head training clone appeared in Naruto's office.

"Yo," The delivery-man clone appeared.

"What's up?" The head apprentice clone appeared.

"New memories and orders," said Naruto. He created a normal shadow clone, which dispelled immediately. While the three were processing the memories, Naruto re-created the spy clone and created another clone, this one wearing his orange jumpsuit. Then Naruto said:

"Begin Project Whirlpool."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Gaara was bored. It was the third day of the Chūnin exams and he was stuck in a tower. Baki-sensei said he wasn't allowed to kill anyone, so he sat in his team's assigned room, making a miniature sand-sculpture of the village of Suna. Then he created a miniature Godzilla and had it smash through the miniature Suna until all that remained was miniature sand-dunes. For the fifth time that morning. Then Gaara sent all of the sand back to his gourd and started creating another miniature sand-sculpture of Suna. Yes, Gaara was very bored.

"Hey Gaara. Whatcha doin'?" asked a cheerful voice from the doorway of Gaara's room.

Gaara did not answer. Was his activity not obvious?

"Whoa," said Naruto. "Is that Suna?"

Gaara looked up at Naruto and nodded.

"That's pretty cool!" said Naruto. He watched as Gaara finished putting details on the Kazekage tower. "What about the people?"

Gaara gave Naruto a blank look. Then he started creating motionless people-figures standing about the streets and on top of buildings.

"Can you make them move?" asked Naruto.

Gaara shook his head. "Not enough control."

"Hm," grunted Naruto. "Here, why don't you let me make the people."

Curious, Gaara sucked the people-figures back into his gourd. Naruto made a cross-shaped hand seal, concentrated and said, "Multiple Shadow Clone Jutsu!"

Suddenly, the entire miniature village was populated by miniature Naruto clones in orange jumpsuits. Each of them transformed into random civilians.

"Hey Gaara, what does the Kazekage look like?"

Gaara used the Henge to transform into the Kazekage, complete with the robes and hat. Naruto created another Shadow clone standing on top of the Kage tower, looking just like Gaara's Henge.

Gaara smirked, waved his hand, and created a sand Godzilla.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

"Kankuro, do you hear that?" asked Temari.

Kankuro went silent. They heard screaming. And maniacal laughter.

"That's coming from our room!" said Temari.

Kankuro paused, trying to hide his fear. "Gaara's in there."

"C'mon, let's go!" Temari exclaimed, darting down the hallway.

The two older Sabaku siblings burst into the room to see Gaara and that weird blond kid, Uzumaki, sitting cross-legged on the floor around a miniature sand model of Suna, about two meters wide. A sand Godzilla, about the size of a house-cat, was rampaging through the city. Miniature civilians were screaming and running around stupidly with their hands in the air. Once in awhile, mini-Godzilla would grab mini-people and gobble them up, resulting in more screaming from the mini-people, and maniacal laughter and giggling from Gaara and Naruto.

Temari and Kankuro stood and gaped.

The mini-Kazekage raised his hands, shouting indistinctly, and Gaara directed a mini-blast of sand from around the Kage tower to form into spikes and shoot themselves at Godzilla. Godzilla just batted them aside, and made as if to roar while Gaara himself produced the sound effects. Then the reptilian monster charged, smashing through buildings, and caught the mini-Kazekage in his teeth, chomping down and causing him to turn into smoke.

Gaara snickered and wiggled his fingers, causing Godzilla to turn to the crowd in the streets.

"Let's make this a little more interesting," said Naruto. "You, you, you, you, and you are now ninjas," he commanded, pointing out various mini-people. His Shadow Clones transformed themselves into the tan uniforms of Suna's Chūnin and Jōnin, leaped onto roofs, and started shooting fireballs at the monster.

Unfortunately, this only contributed to the destruction of the miniature Suna, because when the fireballs converged on Godzilla, they created a miniature explosion that knocked down a fifth of the town nearby.

"Oops," snickered Naruto, "Too much chakra."

"RAAHHH," roared Godzilla, charging at the ninja.

"Raahhh," shouted the mini-ninja, leaping at Godzilla with swords and kunai.

Temari and Kankuro stood and watched, wide-eyed. But they had small smiles on their faces as they watched their little brother having fun with his new friend. Even if it was a rather weird game.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Sasuke was not bored. He was actually quite busy, sitting on his bed in Team 7's assigned room and brooding. He was very good at brooding. All he had to do was sit there with a scowl on his face and imagine all the painful ways he wanted to kill his older brother, but couldn't yet, because he wasn't strong enough. Somehow he was unconsciously exuding chakra and producing a dark and depressing aura around his person.

Sakura, for some reason, thought this was sexy. She was sitting on her bed across from Sasuke's, with her hands clasped together and stars in her eyes.

"Squeeee! Oh Sasuke..." squealed Sakura. Correction: Sakura thought it was _damn sexy_. On a completely unrelated note, Sakura was a fan of movies with sparkly vampires.

THUNK. Orochimaru Shunshined into the room and knocked Sakura out with a single punch. She crashed onto the bed, out cold.

"Ku-ku-ku-ku… Little Sasuke," crooned Orochimaru. He was even more delighted than Sakura to see Sasuke's dark and depressing aura. For a different reasons, of course. He wasn't into little boys – he was just happy to find that his target had psychological issues to exploit.

"I heard that you managed to get your team past the second phase of the exam in, what was it, forty seconds? Impressive, most impressive."

This stranger had a really weird laugh, decided Sasuke. But he straightened proudly when he heard that the man credited him with getting his team through the Forest of Death. "What of it? And who are you?" asked Sasuke.

"Ku-ku-ku. It means that I have decided to give you a gift. My name is Orochimaru. When you want power, you will seek me out!"

It happened in an instant. Orochimaru released his killing intent, causing Sasuke to freeze. The snakelike man made a hand sign, stretched his neck and bit Sasuke on the junction between his neck and his left shoulder.

Then Orochimaru let out more creepy laugh and vanished like dust in the wind.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Naruto was heading back to his team's room when he felt it – a massive burst of killing intent and an absolutely vile, corrupted chakra source.

 _Shit_ , cursed Naruto mentally, _that's coming from our room!_ He quickly dashed out the window and ran up the wall two stories to his team's room. He heard a creepy laugh… and the vile chakra presence was suppressed before vanishing entirely.

Sending a pair of shadow clones to check the situation, Naruto received the all-clear via a clone popping and entered the room through the window. Inside, Sasuke was writhing in pain and Sakura was lying awkwardly on her bed, knocked out.

"Sasuke! What happened?" asked Naruto.

Sasuke groaned and passed out. Naruto checked him over and quickly saw the bite marks and curse seal on Sasuke's neck.

 _That's Orochimaru's work,_ concluded Naruto, not saying it out loud in case anyone was within hearing. _It matches the curse seals we've seen on some of the Oto ninja after we finally managed to infiltrate. And that corrupted chakra must have been his._

"Boss," said Naruto's remaining clone, "Sakura's just knocked out. Possible concussion, bruising, no other damage."

"OK, go and take her to the infirmary here in the tower," ordered Naruto. He immediately created another shadow clone and sent it to find Kakashi.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Kakashi arrived in Team 7's room while Naruto and four shadow clones were preparing an Evil Sealing Method ritual, drawing seals all over Sasuke's upper torso in Naruto's blood.

"Naruto?"

"Good, Kakashi-sensei, you're here. Long story short: Orochimaru, cursed seal, Sasuke. The seal is currently unstable, so I can't remove it until it stabilizes. From what I can detect, it's remotely linked to Orochimaru's chakra, so even after it stabilizes, I can only remove it after Orochimaru is dead and has no more influence on the curse seal. I'm using the Evil Sealing Method to seal it while it's still weak enough to do so, cutting it off from Sasuke's chakra system and forcibly stabilizing it. This will allow me to seal it completely, where it would only be partially sealed if I let it do whatever it's trying to do."

"That sounds… sound," said Kakashi. "Need help? I know the Evil Sealing Method."

"You do? You can check my work then," said Naruto. "I'm confident I got this right, but two heads is better than one."

A couple minutes later and a confirmation from Kakashi, Naruto charged the seal with chakra and said, "Evil Sealing!" The lines of script he had drawn crawled up Sasuke's body and formed an intricate design surrounding Orochimaru's cursed seal.

"Phew," said Naruto, wiping the sweat off his forehead and sitting down. "Now we just need to wait until Sasuke wakes up."

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Sakura woke up slowly. She eventually opened her eyes and took in her surroundings.

"Kakashi-sensei? Why am I in the infirmary?"

"You took a nasty blow to the head. It's a good thing medic-ninja know how to heal concussions almost instantly, or you'd be out of commission for a few days. Do you remember what happened?"

"Uh..." Sakura thought back, "well, I was… Sasuke…" she sighed.

"So you were distracted and you were knocked out before you noticed anything."

"Uh… yes, I guess. Sorry, Kakashi-sensei. Oh, Sasuke… is Sasuke okay? He _was_ in the room with me when I was attacked."

"Sasuke's fine," said Kakashi, not wanting to deal with a Sakura hovering over Sasuke's bed. Which he had purposely had placed in a different room to avoid just that.

 _Sasuke must have confronted and taken out my attacker! Oooh, Sasuke, so brave!_

Kakashi decided to ignore the blissful expression on Sakura's face.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Sasuke woke up and immediately made a low groan. Seriously, he hurt all over. He tried to think of what had caused this pain. That man – Orochimaru? – had said he was… giving Sasuke a gift of power? That was totally out of the blue. Wait, no. He was an Uchiha, so receiving gifts of power totally out of the blue should be normal.

"Ah, Sasuke, good, you're awake." Kakashi's voice interrupted his thoughts. "See if you can drink this. It should help with the soreness."

Sasuke managed to open his eyes and comply.

"Do you remember what happened?" asked Kakashi.

Sasuke closed his eyes in thought. Power… Itachi…

"No," said he.

"Ah, that's too bad," said Kakashi. "We were hoping you could give us a clue about Orochimaru's motives."

"We?" asked Sasuke.

"Yo," said Naruto, announcing his presence from his position out of Sasuke's sight. "The only thing we know is that Orochimaru appeared, knocked out Sakura, and gave you a curse seal. Near as I can tell, the curse seal actually contains a piece of his soul, so to speak, and its main purpose was to give him some sort of control over your mind. Revolting, right? Fortunately, we were able to seal it and contain it before it finished setting in, so to speak, which means it basically has no effect on you whatsoever, except for that cute little tattoo on your neck."

Sasuke raised his hand and covered the left side of his neck, to see if he could feel anything there.

"Don't worry," said Naruto, "We'll eventually be able to remove it completely. We just have to kill Orochimaru first. And you'll be back to normal in a day or two."

 _He's hiding something,_ thought Naruto. _Meh, at least now he has all the information. If he wants to do something stupid, it's not my concern._

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Homura Mitokado was 68 years old. He was pretty spry for an old man, which made sense, considering that he was once on the same team as the Third Hokage.

He was not, however, spry enough to hang upside-down from a rope hanging from a skylight, accurately throw a kunai at an alarm system from 12 meters away, cut open four steel bolts with a hacksaw in one hand, steal the largest diamond in Konoha from its display case, then nimbly flip over and climb up the rope hand-over-hand. All without the use of chakra, because the gray-haired individual doing so was suppressing his chakra to avoid detection.

Which was strange, given the lack of other appropriate security measures. Such as covering his head, because all he wore was a mask that covered the lower half of his face. Or looking for hidden security cameras. Or wiping the fingerprints off the kunai he threw at the alarm system.

So when, the next morning, the horrified private collector who owned the diamond reported the crime, it was a matter of mere hours before the ninja police, with the assistance of an Inuzuka, tracked down the diamond to a box buried under a bush in Homura's yard.

When the police asked Homura, "Where were you last night between 9:35 pm and 10:00 pm?", Homura said, "I was at Kusunoki's Bar," before he shut his mouth and refused to answer more.

When the police went to Kusunoki's Bar, none of the employees or the regulars could confirm Homura's presence. When the police asked about any generally remarkable activity last night, the only thing they came up with was a new rumor that had been spread, saying that the demon brat was planning to betray the village.

Fortunately for Homura, he was far more spry politically than he was physically, so he managed to get off more or less scot-free. He had to trade in a lot of favors, though.

However, the police, being ninja, looked underneath the underneath and concluded that Homura's under-the-table method of getting his charges dropped was proof that he was guilty. Unable to take him to a court of law, they took him to the court of public opinion.

Many, many boxes of donuts were consumed in the ensuing discussions. They may have been ninja, but they were still police.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

Six teams had passed the Second Phase of the Chūnin Exam: four from Konoha, one from Suna, and one from Oto. Kabuto's teammates were rather puzzled about his disappearance, but assumed that he had gotten lost, killed, or eaten.

All eighteen Chūnin hopefuls lined up in ranks in the central hall of the Forest of Death tower, listening as the proctor, Hayate Gekko, explained the preliminaries as the Hokage, the other proctors, and the Jōnin sensei looked on.

"For the matchups, we have procured a computer which will use a random number generator to select two participants to fight each other. The names will be displayed on the large screen on the wall behind me.

"Does anyone wish to withdraw? Anyone feel unable to continue?"

No one withdrew.

"Very well then. Let us begin the preliminaries! Participants, please move up to the balconies."

Hayate signaled to the hidden computer-ninja. Yes, they had actual, real-life computer-ninja. Konoha was proud to say they had the fastest hunt-and-peck typists in the entire world.

"First match, Sasuke Uchiha vs. Kiba Inuzuka!"

Kiba tried trash-talking Sasuke. This unfortunately, lost him the psychological battle, because Sasuke simply stuck his nose in the air and refused to respond.

"Begin!" shouted the proctor.

"Beast Human Clone!" shouted Kiba, using the Inuzuka clan jutsu to turn himself and Akamaru into two identical copies of a feral Kiba, one of them crouched on the other's back.

Off to the side, Orochimaru, disguised as the Oto team's Jōnin-sensei, watched eagerly. _An Inuzuka. This will not be a challenge for Sasuke._ _Still, I'm eager to see how quickly Sasuke ends the fight._

Then Sasuke activated his Sharingan.

He had only one tomoe in each eye. Orochimaru choked on his spit.

"Hn," said Sasuke, "You can't fool me. With the power of the mighty Sharingan, I can tell that the one on top is the dog."

Orochimaru almost scoffed out loud. Seriously?! Anyone could tell that they hadn't switched places! Had he been badly fooled about Sasuke's skills?

"Fang Over Fang!" shouted Kiba, bringing out the big guns because he knew he would need it against the Rookie of the Year.

"Fire Style: Great Fireball Jutsu!" shouted Sasuke. He hit Akamaru, knocking the small dog out of his transformation and leaving him singed and in pain. With his Sharingan, it was easy to see where Kiba's Fang Over Fang attack was going and dodge him.

"Nooo! Akamaru! I'll get you for that, you bastard! Fang Over Fang!"

Sasuke used a Kawarimi to switch with Akamaru. Kiba smashed into his own partner, injuring Akamaru further.

It was official. Sasuke was evil.

"Proctor, I give up. Akamaru needs a medic!"

And… Orochimaru was happy again. Sasuke was evil. He could work with that.

"Winner by forfeit: Sasuke Uchiha. Medics!"

After the medics had taken Akamaru away, Hayate signaled for the next matchup to be made.

The screen said: _Shikamaru Nara vs. Dosu Kinuta._

Shikamaru yawned. "This is going to be sooo troublesome."

Dosu was a rather large fourteen-year-old with most of his head wrapped in bandages, except for one eye. He had a bundle of fur attached to his back, and stood hunched over. He made his way into the arena without saying anything.

"Begin!" shouted Hayate once the two were facing each other.

Dosu and Shikamaru both immediately jumped back. Shikamaru threw a kunai experimentally at his opponent. Dosu blocked it with his right arm, producing a clanging sound.

The two stared at each other for a minute.

"Waiting for me to make the first move?" asked Dosu, rhetorically. "Very well, I shall oblige."

He rushed at Shikamaru, uncovering a metal gauntlet on his right arm with multiple holes in it. Suddenly he stopped and jumped back, as Shikamaru's shadow stretched out towards him.

"I don't know what that does," said Dosu, "but I don't think I want to find out."

Shikamaru's shadow stopped and retreated at about halfway across the room.

"Hmm," said Shikamaru. "Based on the fact that you rushed at me before trying to use your gauntlet, and the fact that you didn't use it after jumping back, your attack has a limited effective range. I'm guessing some kind of… sound based attack?"

Dosu didn't react. Shikamaru began circling the room. Dosu also began circling in the same direction as Shikamaru.

Suddenly, Dosu raised his arm and let loose a blast of sound in Shikamaru's direction.

Shikamaru dodged before the sound blast left Dosu's gauntlet. It was obvious he had expected the attack.

"So you know how sound works," said Dosu. "You expected me to try to amplify my attack using the walls in the corner of the room, but you knew that the amplification would be limited to that area."

Shikamaru sighed. "This is so troublesome. You can't get close to me, I can't get close to you, and both of us have limited-range attacks. I have a proposal. How about we stop fighting and decide this with a game of shogi?"

Dosu appeared to consider this idea.

Hayate, the proctor, interrupted. "Do that and I'll disqualify you both. We don't have time to watch a shogi match." _Damn Naras._

"What a drag," said Shikamaru. He pulled out a kunai and lazily chucked it at Dosu, who, like before, deflected it with his gauntlet.

Dosu returned the favor by throwing a spread of three kunai at Shikamaru, who dodged.

Shikamaru pulled out four kunai and threw them all at Dosu. One of them had a paper tag attached to the handle.

Dosu, seeing the tag and not wanting to be anywhere near an explosion, unleashed a sound blast at the spread of kunai before it reached him.

SPLAT. A huge blob of grayish goo exploded and splattered Dosu, clogging up the holes on his gauntlet. Sound waves can disrupt and destroy things, but they don't exert actual force, so they can't stop a large flying mass from following its natural trajectory.

Shikamaru dashed forward and used his Shadow Imitation jutsu.

"Ack! Pffth! What IS this stuff?!"

"It's sticky... grayish... goo," deadpanned Shikamaru. "Don't worry, it won't melt you. You have other problems."

He backed away quickly, forcing Dosu to imitate him, until the Oto ninja slammed his head into the wall, knocking himself out.

"Winner by knockout, Shikamaru Nara," said Hayate. "And I'm not cleaning that up."

When Shikamaru got up to the balcony where his team was watching, Ino confronted him with a 'that was revolting' expression on her face.

"Where did you get that.. goo, Shikamaru?"

Shikamaru shrugged. "Naruto makes sure his friends always have lots of prank supplies."

"Naruto, where did you get that goo?"

"Oh," said Naruto, "it turns out if you collect hundreds of thousands of boogers, and you keep them all together, they start breeding. Why, you want one?" Naruto pulled out a paper sealing tag and waved it in Ino's direction.

Sakura took a swing at Naruto, who dodged and grinned.

"Next match!"

 _Temari Sabaku vs. Hinata Hyuga_ was displayed on the screen.

Temari won the match almost immediately, blasting Hinata with a strong gust of wind and knocking her out against the wall immediately. It was a poor matchup for Hinata: without the Kaiten or any other defensive jutsu, she was unable to protect herself against wide-range long-distance attacks. A fireball, she could dodge. A powerful gust of wind that spread itself when it hit the floor, not so much.

"Well, that was fast," said Hayate dryly. "Next match."

The match board lit up: _Naruto Uzumaki vs. Naruto Uzumaki._

As the proctor, and everybody else in the room, blinked at the screen, an orange-clad Naruto made a shadow clone, jumped down into the arena, and yelled, "Wooo-hooo! Let's do this!"

"Start the match!" shouted the shadow clone. "I'mma beat the crap outta you!"

"Oh no you won't!" shouted Naruto, pointing his finger at his clone. "I'm stronger, faster, and better-looking than you!"

"Better-looking? You're delusional, shrimp!"

"HEY! Who are you calling a shrimp, shrimp?!"

"Alright, enough!" interrupted Hayate. "Uzumaki, get back on the balcony. I'm gonna see what's going on and then we're going to redo the matchup."

Naruto and his clone groaned and climbed back up to the balcony. "But I wanted to fight me."

A few minutes later, Hayate was back. "Sorry for the interruption, folks. The computer-ninja tells me that when he programmed the random match generator, he forgot to make sure no one was matched up with themselves. But he wants me to remind everyone that even if he sucks as a programmer, he's still the fastest hunt-and-peck typist in the entire world. Okay, next match!"

 _Tenten Higurashi vs. Ino Yamanaka_

Tenten rolled her eyes when she got to the arena. "Oh great. A fangirl. This'll be easy."

"Yeah? So what? Just because I love Sasuke doesn't mean I can't beat you!"

"Begin!"

Tenten opened by pelting Ino with kunai and shuriken. Ino tried dodging and deflecting, but Tenten was able to accurately aim ahead of where Ino was moving, and the barrage was just too much. Ino went down with shuriken in her arms and side and kunai in one of her shoulders and each of her legs.

Tenten dashed at her and held a tanto to Ino's neck. "Surrender," she demanded.

Ino gave up. And quickly fainted.

"Next match!" said Hayate after sending Ino off to the infirmary and Tenten back to the balcony.

 _Sakura Haruno vs. Rock Lee_

Naruto immediately started snickering.

"Oh, Sakura," said Lee, "I do not know if I can bring myself to fight against someone as beautiful as you!"

"SHUT UP, IDIOT! I only love Sasuke!"

"But… you promised that you would go on a date with me!"

"WHAT?! I NEVER PROMISED THAT!"

"Indeed, you did! You said you would go on a date with the winner of the most youthful fight between Sasuke and I, and I won!"

"It's true!" shouted Naruto from the balcony. "You did!"

Several others who had seen the fight before the first part of the exam nodded in agreement.

"Well I don't care! I'm not going on a date with you!" declared Sakura.

"But… but… to break a promise is most un-youthful!"

"GAH! Cut it out with the youth already! Proctor, start the fight!"

"But… Sakura…"

Finally, Guy came to the rescue. "Lee, my precious student!" he said, wrapping an arm around Lee's shoulders in a manly hug. "Here is what you must do. You must show her the power of YOUTH! You must battle against Sakura and prove your YOUTH to her until she falls into your arms! And if she still rejects you, then you must let her go! For sometimes you will meet people who are unable to appreciate the beauty and power of YOUTH! And you must not let that bring you down, for if you do, then you will not be able to continue growing and getting stronger and becoming ever more YOUTHFUL!"

"GUY-SENSEI! THANK YOU!" shouted Lee, hugging his teacher. "I shall do as you say and show Sakura the power of YOUTH!"

Up in the balcony, Naruto, standing next to Kakashi, remarked, "You know, if you translate that from youth-speak, that's actually some pretty damn good advice."

"That's Guy for you," said Kakashi. "Don't tell him I said this, but there's a reason I don't always ignore his 'eternal rival' challenges."

"[cough, cough], enough!" interrupted Hayate, before this could turn into a full-blown hugging scene with sunset and waves. "Let's get to the fight already! Guy, get out of the arena. Fighters, are you ready?"

Guy withdrew, and Lee and Sakura nodded.

"Begin!"

"YOSH!" shouted Lee, "Sakura! Behold the power of YOUTH!"

He turned into a green blur, beat the crap out of Sakura, and caught her in his arms when she fell unconscious.

"Winner by knockout, Rock Lee," said Hayate, bored. "Next match."

 _Shino Aburame vs. Kankuro Sabaku_

This match was over very quickly. Neither fighter said anything. Shino sent a cloud of his kikaichu bugs at Kankuro, who quickly lost control of his puppet and came crashing out of the backpack where he was hiding. He was forced to concede due to chakra exhaustion.

 _Gaara Sabaku vs. Zaku Abumi_

Gaara was leaking his bijuu's killing intent and demonic chakra.

"I give up," said Zaku, before entering the arena.

The next match was: _Naruto Uzumaki vs. Neji Hyuga_

"You should give up now, like Zaku did," said Neji as he walked down the balcony stairs. "You cannot win. You are a failure, a dead-last, and you cannot win against a genius like me."

"No way!" said Naruto, still wearing his I'm-stupid-and-I-wear-an-orange-jumpsuit act. "I've been training for this! I'm gonna beat you so bad you'll be seeing frogs dancing behind your eyelids for the next month!"

"Frogs… what? Never mind. It is your fate to lose. The weak always lose to the strong. You should not delude yourself into thinking that just because you have done a little training, you can beat a prodigy."

"Proctor, please start the match." said Naruto, standing across from Neji.

Up in the balcony, Kakashi opened his Sharingan. He didn't want to miss anything.

"Begin!"

Neji dashed towards Naruto.

Naruto just stood there, hands at his sides, not taking any stance, staring at Neji.

Neji closed with Naruto. "You are within my range of d-URK!"

One second, Naruto's hands were at his side. An instant later, Naruto was pulling his fingers away from the pressure points in Neji's neck, where he had disrupted the blood flow to Neji's brain. Neji fell to the ground, unconscious.

"Well that was anti-climactic," said Hayate. "Winner by knockout, Naruto Uzumaki."

"I'll never understand," said Naruto, walking back to the balcony, "why the Hyuga pause to say 'you are within my range of divination' before they start their Eight Trigrams moves. 'You are within my range of divination'," he said, testing the words out, "'You-are-within-my-range-of-divination. Youarewithinmyrangeofdivination.' No matter how fast you say it, it still takes a minimum of about one and a half seconds to say that. It's a Taijutsu move, it's not like a Ninjutsu where saying the name helps with concentration. Why the heck would you give an enemy one and a half seconds when you could just start attacking right away?"

"Final match," announced Hayate, "Choji Akimichi vs. Kin Tsuchi."

Kin attempted to use her senbon-and-bell sound-based Genjutsu on Choji. Unfortunately for her, she was only able to throw one handful of senbon before Choji used his Human Bullet Tank jutsu, which blocked the senbon rather than dodging them, leaving her without bells in the proper place for the Genjutsu. Without a chance to use Genjutsu, and without having a powerful enough technique or weapon to stop the Akimichi's signature jutsu, it was only a matter of time before Kin was flattened.

"Well," said Hayate, "will the winners please come down to the arena?"

The winners were:

\- Sasuke, having beat Kiba  
\- Shikamaru, having beat Dosu  
\- Temari, having beat Hinata  
\- Tenten, having beat Ino  
\- Lee, having beat Sakura  
\- Shino, having beat Kankuro  
\- Gaara, having scared Zaku into submission  
\- Naruto, having beat Neji  
\- Choji, having beat Kin

"Okay. To avoid the risk of our computer-ninja messing up again, we'll do this the old way. Everyone pick a paper, which will determine your position in the bracket."

Once the matchings for the Final Phase were determined, the bracket was:

Quarterfinals:

1\. Tenten vs. Shino  
2\. Choji vs. Shikamaru  
3\. Naruto vs. Temari  
4\. Lee vs. Sasuke  
5\. Gaara vs. Winner of match 1.

This would leave four people to move on to the next round.

Semifinals:

6\. Winner of match 2 vs. Winner of match 3.  
7\. Winner of match 4 vs. Winner of match 5.

Round 3:

8\. Winner of match 6 vs. Winner of match 7.

The remaining Chūnin hopefuls had one month to train and prepare for their fights.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

After the preliminaries, Naruto remembered one of the most useful chapters of his father's book when it came to fighting.

How to be a Ninja  
by Minato Namikaze

 **Chapter 7: Chakra Makes Everything Better**

So you've practiced your chakra control until you're past Jōnin level. You've expanded your chakra pool to ridiculous levels. You know some Ninjutsu, and perhaps some Genjutsu, and you can use them awesomely well, but you know that there's more being a ninja than spamming jutsu. It's finally time for you to start enhancing your body with chakra!

Most Taijutsu experts in our world like to exercise… and practice… and exercise… and practice. What they don't do is read chakra theory, and actually connect it to their field of expertise. All that exercise and practice? It actually does three things. First, with the appropriate amount of exercise and nutrition, it makes you stronger. Second, the practice improves your nervous system's reflexes and skills. And third, the item that everyone forgets or doesn't understand: it causes you to instinctively and sub-consciously enhance your muscles and senses with chakra.

The key word there is sub-conscious. What I did, and what I want you to do, is use your now excellent chakra control to _consciously_ enhance your body and senses with chakra. With careful experimentation, you can spend mere months and reach a level of chakra-enhanced strength, speed and reflexes that the average Taijutsu practitioner would take years to reach. It takes additional practice to take this intentional chakra enhancement to a level where it becomes a muscle-memory, so to speak, and you can use it subconsciously. But it's a hell of a lot faster than just exercising until your body does it automatically.

Section (a): Muscles

First thing you should practice with is your muscles. Start by internally channeling a small amount of chakra to your biceps, about enough to stick to a tree. Make sure you are keeping that chakra internal: drop a leaf on your arm and check to see if it sticks. If it sticks, you're leaking chakra. If it acts normal and drops off, you're not wasting anything.

Now focus the purpose of that chakra on strengthening the muscle. Make sure you stretch the chakra to include the tendons at either end of the muscle: you don't want to tear them. Finally, start lifting weights!

You'll have to play around with small, incremental amounts of chakra to figure out how much you can channel into each muscle. After each experiment, you need to drain your muscles of all extra chakra, leaving them with just the amount that's normally flowing through your blood. Clench your muscles a couple of times to make sure they're not sore or hurting – if there's any pain, you've either used too much chakra and you need to back off, or you've failed to properly enhance a part, like the tendons connecting the muscle to the bone, and you have (hopefully minor) tearing. In either case, rest those muscles for couple of days and let them heal. Both cases are actually what happens when someone opens the Eight Inner Gates without having a body prepared to handle that much chakra: the entire body is over-filled with chakra, and you get burns and tearing due to lack of control.

This is why we start with muscles. If you started with, say, your eyes, you could accidentally blind yourself permanently. It's much easier for a muscle to heal, or if necessary repair it using medical ninjutsu, than to fix an eye. Or worse yet, your brain. (Yes, you can enhance your brain with chakra. Later!)

Note that chakra enhancement does not negate the need for physical strength. The weaker you are, the more chakra you need to lift a boulder above your head. Physical strength is multiplicative when it comes to chakra enhancement, not additive. So if, without chakra, you can lift 30 pounds in each hand, a certain amount of chakra will double that strength to 60 pounds. If, without chakra, you can lift 100 pounds, a certain amount of chakra will double it so you can lift 200 pounds. There's a limit to how much chakra you can add to your muscles before your muscle tissue starts getting burns, so you do need to strengthen yourself physically. Fortunately, if you consciously avoid using chakra when you exercise, your rate of physical improvement is faster as well.

Section (b): Sensory Organs

Once you have a good deal of practice enhancing your muscles, start enhancing your sensory organs. Channel a tiny (very tiny, start with barely enough to stick a leaf to your skin) bit of chakra to the sensory membrane of your nose, the taste buds on your tongue, and to your eardrum and the bones in your ear. You'll want to practice this in a clean, quiet area where there are no offensive smells or noises, and you'll want to wait a few hours after brushing your teeth (trust me, the magnified taste of toothpaste can be overwhelming).

Once you've mastered taste, hearing and smell, move on to your eyes. You'll need to be very, very careful with your eyes, you'll want to try one eye at a time, and you'll want to know everything about ocular anatomy before you start. The eye is a very complex organ. With chakra manipulation, you can consciously change the size of your pupils, the shape of the lens, even the sensitivity of the retina. You can even get your eyes to zoom in and use telescopic vision. You can even speed up the "framerate" of your eyes by enhancing both the retina and the optic nerve… which brings us to the next section.

Section (c): Nerves & Brain

For this, you'll need high medic-nin levels of chakra control. You'll be using chakra on tiny, narrow groups of cells, sometimes even single cells, distinguishing them from the surrounding tissue. Which is exactly what high-level medics need to do when treating their patients. Only difference is they are doing cellular manipulation with a chakra transformation, while you're not. On the other hand, you're doing it without hand seals and you'll eventually practice until you can do it in high-stress situations while you're distracted.

When you enhance your sensory organs, some applications require you to enhance the nerves connecting that organ to the brain. You can learn to do this with a great deal of careful self-reflective meditation as well as a detailed knowledge of anatomy.

Finally, the brain. Be careful. Be very, very careful. I have only experimented with enhancing the muscular control and sensory perception areas of the brain. I theorize that the Yamanaka clan has a bloodline that involves automatically enhancing and altering certain areas of the brain, but I don't know which ones and I don't know what the alterations are. You don't want to accidentally enhance your nightmares, or Kami forbid, mess with your libido. Puberty was bad enough. And stay away from the pleasure centers… I theorize that enhancing your pleasure centers will cause you to want to add more chakra to those pleasure centers, triggering a horrible feedback loop which will end in burning out the pleasure centers of your brain, which could end up with you feeling miserable for the rest of your life.

It's okay to poke around your brain during meditation with extremely small amounts of chakra just to figure out which parts of the brain do what. But keep it WAY below the range where major enhancement occurs, and do experimentation using tiny controlled bursts, not in any kind of prolonged enhancement.

Interesting point: your experience with manipulating chakra in your brain will make it very, very easy to sense when someone else's chakra is influencing your nervous system: in other words, you can detect mind- and sense-affecting Genjutsu instantly. Breaking it is as easy as cutting off the external chakra flow using your own and removing the foreign chakra from your system.

Section (d): Imitating Dojutsu (Eye-type Bloodline Limits)

Now this is ridiculously fun. I believe that, with sufficient chakra control and manipulation (read: totally insane, probably unprecedented control), you can actually imitate most Kekkei Genkai.

Example: the Sharingan, which I've actually imitated in experimental conditions. The Sharingan, like most Dojutsu, projects a field of chakra that pervades the environment and sends feedback to the user's eyes, thus allowing it to receive more information than it can get from just light photons. Thus allowing the user to 'see' chakra.

This ability to 'see' chakra allows users to see the chakra of a Genjutsu and automatically counter it by blocking the foreign chakra from entering their body.

In addition, the ability to 'see' chakra allows the Sharingan to see how the chakra of Ninjutsu techniques is molded outside the body, which is part of the 'copying' ability of the Sharingan. The other part of the 'copying' ability of the Sharingan is the fact that it enhances the optical nerves, vision centers of the brain, and memory centers of the brain, allowing the user to perceive everything in slow-motion and memorize it easily.

While the projected chakra field is not as powerful in perceptive ability as the Byakugan's, the Sharingan allows the user to actually manipulate that chakra field and perform Genjutsu. The easiest way for a Sharingan user to do this is to make eye contact with a target and push some of that chakra into the target's brain through their eyes. I'm not sure why it's so difficult for a Sharingan to do Genjutsu without eye contact, but I suspect it has something to do with the fact that the Sharingan already 'knows' how to send chakra to the brain through the optic nerves.

I believe the fabled Mangekyo Sharingan (which I've never actually seen in action) involves actually channeling powerful Ninjutsu through the eyes. Either that, or it's a myth and Madara Uchiha, the only known person who is said to have activated it, was fooling everyone and could really perform Ninjutsu seal-lessly… and he only did that with his own jutsu creations… and only the S-ranked ones… yeah, those last two last items make it kind of unlikely.

Anyway, like I said, I was able to imitate the basic Sharingan while sitting still and focusing really hard. This is one of the secrets to my most famous technique: the Hiraishin. While using the Hiraishin, I would enhance my retinas, optic nerves, and the vision centers of my brain, increasing just my perception speed. This, combined with enhancing most of my muscles, bones and other organs in order to keep them intact, has the effect of making the rest of the world seem to run in slow motion, and, unlike the average Uchiha who simply uses the Sharingan, allows me to actually act at the speed of my perception.

* * *

– CS –

* * *

The day after the Preliminaries, Naruto was walking down the street in the middle of Konoha.

As he passed Ichiraku's, he heard a voice.

"Brother, those are some groooovy threads," said the voice.

Naruto turned to see who spoke. Someone dropped a camouflage jutsu. There, sitting atop a huge rainbow-colored toad which, sitting down, was as tall as Naruto himself, was a man. A man with shoulder-length white hair, wearing bell-bottomed jeans patterned with daisies, a large tie-dyed T-shirt and a tan leather vest. He wore sunglasses, had a peace-sign necklace, wore a brightly-colored necktie as a headband, and had a flower painted on each cheek.

"Why thank you," said Naruto. "Not everybody appreciates the awesomeness of orange. I'm Naruto Uzumaki. It's nice to meet you!"

"Fab, a cool head," said the man. "I guess I oughtta introduce myself. I am the Eternal Hippie and Kami's Gift to Womankind, Jiraya the Toad Sage!"

* * *

– CS –

* * *

 **Author's Note:** HAHA! I guess I got bored of all the fanfics that use a totally canon portrayal of Jiraya's character. All of the best pervert jokes and scenes about the Canon Jiraya have already been made… most of them actually in canon. So I changed things up a bit. He's still a pervert, but now he's a hippie too!

I actually did use a random number generator for the Prelims matchups. I think I picked four of them for plot purposes (or for laughs, like Lee vs. Sakura), but the rest are random. And the Final Phase matchups are totally random.


End file.
